Ten on Tuesday

1. Zane has become a little book worm over the past week. I think he picked up this wonderful hobby from watching Maggie and Brendan sit quietly, listening to their parents read them books, during their recent visit. He now picks a book off the shelf, toddles it over to us and then after we are done reading it (usually multiple times) he toddles it back over to the book shelf area. He hasn't mastered getting the book back on an actual shelf, but he is close. Sunday we took a trip to the bookstore to get some new books for our, currently pretty pathetic, book collection. P.S. books are unnecessarily expensive

 

2. I finally sorted Zane's toys and put his baby toys away. Zane watched very carefully as I put them all in a big plastic storage bag. He was fine too see them all go, except he had to rescue Dolarus, his duck friend. She was his faithful companion to all of his doctor's appointments, including pre-op day at the hospital. He reached into the big bag of toys, dug around, and rescued her. It was the cutest the ever. He hasn't played with her since, but I guess he couldn't bare the thought of her stored away with all the toys.

 

3. Zach, Zane, and I had a wonderfully calm weekend. We cleaned house, played in the basement, went to the Zoo, played in the pool, read books, and had wonderful family time. This is is a rarity since almost every weekend I am not working we have some where to go or something to do. I work this weekend, inlcuding the 4th, and the next weekend I will be in OK for a quick visit.

 

4. I have recently been wanting to take Zane to a park to play, but couldn't figure where there was a park close to us that didn't have rocks or sand under their play equipment. Today I found a wonderful website that has a map of all the parks, what kind of amenities they have, pictures of the play areas, and has multiple ideas of other outdoor activities. For example Zane totally should be part of the STL Garden club next year, they meet the first Saturday of every month and talk about plants and gardening with kids. Who knew the St. Louis County Parks department was that pulled together. Here is the site for anyone in STL looking for a fun park or outdoor activity near you

 

5. Zane is going to have his one year pictures taken on Friday. That is if he doesn't have too bad of a bruise or scratch on his face at that time. He had a little bruise between his eyes on Sunday, a run in with the pan he was "cooking in" outside, but it has since gotten better. Then yesterday I got home from work and he had scratched the side of his head on the wall, all battle wounds from trying to learn how to walk and really wanting to run. My plan for now is to take him as he is, because some bumps and bruises are just part of being a toddler. I am sure he will be very adorable. We are having them taken at the Botanical Gardens so I am sure they will be lovely. Maybe we can capture one of Zane's new favorite outside activities, hugging trees, literally. Grandma B would be so proud.

 

6. Also, over the weekend Zane learned how to get out of his pool one leg at a time instead of head first. It only took him a few trips tumbling out before he learned that this new technique works much better. It would be helpful if his legs were just a tad bit longer, but he makes it work. Maybe this will help decrease the number of bumps and bruises in the future.

 

 7. Zane is officially been off bottles for a week and I can't say it is going great. I don't think he drink nearly enough during the day, though I constantly offer him milk and water. He has been drinking at least half a sippy cup of milk before bedtime, but has also started randomly waking up crying during the night. He usually will go back to sleep if we give him his binki, but sometimes (like this morning) he thinks 4:45 is the morning. Or like the night before when he randomly was up and down for an hour. This is NOT ok. We had a talk about it this evening before we put him down, hopefully it gets better. Zach thinks Zane is punishing us for taking away his bottles, he may have a point.

8. While I am in OK Zach is going to go down to SEMO to pick up our half a cow of grass fed beef, fresh from the butcher. I am so excited. I grew up on fresh beef and if you have never had it you have no idea what you are missing. I can't wait to have a freezer full of delicious beef to use anytime. Thanks Amy and Mike!

9. This weekend a smaller floor at the hospital is going to come up to our floor for the summer, in order to save money by not having to keep that unit open in the summer when the census is low. This coincides with July 1st, the day that brand new doctors get set loose in the hospital. Oh did I mention it is a holiday weekend. It is going to be a debacle, I can already tell. Send prayers to SLCH this weekend.

10. Tomorrow is officially go time on the swim suit hunt. I am sick to my stomach already. Poor Zane is going to have to witness that, he is going to be scared for life.