News & Notes, Season End Edition

Jacob had his last lacrosse game of the season today.  No points, but it's really great to see how the team has improved over the course of the season.  A bunch of young kids that couldn't scoop up a ground ball or complete a pass really came into their own by the end of the season.  They didn't win too many games, but the second half of the season they stayed competitive and won or tied a few.  It was fun to watch...even more fun than the ball-hog-led blow-out wins over the last two seasons.  The bummer is that he's supposed to move up next year.  A good chunk of his team will do the same, but the problem is that there will be quite a few kids on the team, and the ball hogs from previous years will be on that team, too.  We'll see how that goes.  We'll miss some of the families from this year, though.  It's hard to believe he's done with the season after all of the waiting we did all winter to get him back on the field.  Now we have a long wait until November, when everything starts again.  He'll have at least one camp and lots of playing in the driveway (no doubt) until then, but it's a bit of a bummer that it's over because I know how passionate he is about it and he'll definitely miss that outlet.

In the meantime, we'll get more serious about baseball.  He's missed one game a week so far because of lacrosse (while missing one lacrosse practice most weeks to make his other baseball game), so we'll finally get to focus on one sport.  Ironically, baseball got rained out today due to a nasty thunderstorm this morning, but we still got to sit and roast through a steamy lacrosse game.  Thank goodness for the breeze that showed up halfway through, because it was awful for a while!  Baseball games are longer and far more boring because of this whole kid-pitch format this year.  The kids can't pitch well, so there aren't many hits until the coaches take over, and even then the fielders are so bored that half the time they miss the ball when it does get hit.  We only have a few weeks left of that, though, and then we'll be free for the summer to pursue other opportunities.  Jacob mentioned guitar lessons a while back, but we'll just have to keep our eyes open.  One less night a week will be nice, though.

We finally have a weekend that's shaping up to be photo-worthy!  Tonight we have Little League Night at the Red Wings game, so we'll be out on the field and watching the Zooperstars!  Tomorrow it looks like we'll be going to the Buffalo Zoo, possibly with my parents.  I've had a Groupon for months, and it just hasn't worked out to go, and it expires at the end of the month.  Tomorrow looks like a good day for it.  I hate to make yet another trip to Buffalo as we'll have plenty coming up, but I think it will be a lot of fun, and it's an excuse to spend some time with my dad prior to Father's Day, since they'll be visiting my brother and we'll be with Craig's family for the actual holiday.  Hopefully we'll end up with some great photo ops from all of this!

I'm feeling a little less productive this weekend, though I did vacuum part of the house and get a couple long-unused gift cards set up for cash back through a couple different sites.  Let's hope they work!  One was for a place that's no longer around here, and another was a rather large one we received as a gift when Carter was born, but was for a place we rarely shop at (and the one location left around here is way across town).  Also, that place is so overpriced that anything we lose from the value to get the redemption would have been what we overpaid anyway!  For example, if I could have gotten Carter a pair of pants, I would have spent $30 for something I could have gotten for $10 elsewhere.  So, I think it's worth it.  We'll see how it goes!

Next Friday Jacob has his first appointment with the next round of behavioral specialists.  Sometimes he seems almost normal, but then he will completely refute our authority, freak out if I try to touch him, or insist that I hate him, and it's crystal clear that we need some help.  I keep trying to think of a concise statement of what we need help with, but it's hard.  He needs to be more thoughtful, both about others' feelings and about his behavior in general.  For example, remembering to use a fork when he eats or not using the clean shirt he's holding as a place to wipe his nose.  We need him to not flip out if Carter gets within a foot of him, or to be more willing to let me fix his hair or kiss him on the forehead.  We need him to understand our authority, end of story.  He needs help in cutting through the constant clutter in his brain to focus on important things.  He's always making plans in his mind, but sometimes he needs to get off his own agenda and focus on other things.  He could be such an amazing kid, but the constant arguing and demanding is wearing us thin.  We've told him it could make things easier for him, and I've told him that we appreciate his uniqueness, but that we need to refine some things so it's easier for him to interact in society and live in our house!

Bedtime is still a late night event for Carter, but nap time today seemed a bit better.  I'm still holding out hope it's a phase.  

We're going into Jacob's last full week of school (and of age seven, for that matter), which blows my mind.  We have a lot of stuff coming up--school stuff, birthday stuff, a new summer camp--so the next few weeks will be eventful.

Well, for now it's off to baseball for the night.  More soon!

N-O to the N-A-P

Such a strange turn of events...the one thing that maintains my sanity some days has become the culprit of some of the biggest stress in my life right now.  Whouda thunk it?  Yes, Carter's nap is ruining everything.

Jacob napped right up until the summer before he went to Kindergarten, when we had to stop having him nap at daycare, both because we wanted him to adjust to life without it and because he was staying up extra late with that second wind of energy.  I think he had given it up at home much of the time by then, but for the most part naps lasted right up until he was five.  We may have had a few periods before that where he stayed up late, but those phases were relatively short-lived because we never banned him from naps permanently until that summer.  But now it looks like we may need to do that extra early with Carter.  Granted, it's only been about a week, but he is taking things to the extreme right now and it is making us crazy.

Another culprit is his new big boy bed.  I'm starting to think that part of the advantage of getting your kid out of a crib early is that they blindly believe you when you give them all sorts of threats about leaving the bed.  They believe it and it just becomes habit.  However, Carter is apparently old enough to have ideas big enough to overshadow consequences in his mind.  We're having a heck of a time getting him to stay in bed.  He's been up and down, turning the light on and off, grabbing toys and books, singing and yelling, having to visit the bathroom, and doing everything he can to stay awake.  He was awake until 11pm one night, 11:30 another night, 10:30 last night, and possibly 10:30 tonight.  I was up there at 10:15 when I heard him turn his light on, and gave him a stern warning to stay in bed.  But unlike most times when he gets sternly warned, this seems to go in one ear and out the other.  It's not like him to immediately ignore what you say and start doing it all over again (that is a page out of Jacob's book, however), but in this case, he's right back to his antics a few minutes after you walk out.  The lure of freedom must be really strong.  Even still, all I can figure is that his nap is suddenly just enough to keep him awake to do all of this. 

Of course, in the morning he sleeps late.  At daycare I think there is enough peer pressure to still get him down for a nap by 1pm, but at home on weekends, the late morning means he doesn't want to nap at his normal time.  So he will screw around in his room for a couple hours, finally fall asleep at 3:30 right before I'm ready to release him from "rest time", and then sleep late.  On Saturday he slept until around 5pm, which I knew was a mistake, but I got caught up in things and didn't get back up there earlier.  On Sunday I fell asleep on the couch around 4pm, and when I finally regained full consciousness, I realized it was 5:30 and he was still sleeping!  So of course he was up crazy late both of those nights.  But even with earlier nap wake times during the week, he's still doing the late night thing.  He's completely screwed up.

Of course, complicating this is that he is clearly not ready to ditch the nap. The last two times he skipped, he was falling asleep sitting up at dinner.  It happened at my family Memorial Day picnic (which wasn't unexpected given the hot weather and all the running around he did), but then it happened again last week when he was home sick with Craig (the gooey eyes that led to a diagnosis of a slight ear infection).  He didn't nap, and then we had to do everything in our power to keep him awake at dinner!  He was siting there, chewing, with the heaviest eyelids.  Poor kid. 

The bright side is that since the nap is at least partially to blame for the lack of weekend activities lately, we may be released from that situation sooner than we thought.  Carter goes down for a nap at 1:30, refuses to sleep until 3:30, then naps until 5:00, which effectively takes over the entire afternoon.  We can't do anything else all day if we want Carter to sleep.  It's right in the middle of the day, and we can't fit in anything else on either end.  It's hard to fit things in the morning as it is (particularly with sports on Saturday and church on Sunday), and not everything we want to do is open in the evenings.  So this is part of why we haven't had much fun lately. 

In theory, ditching the nap should solve two problems--the late nights and the homebound afternoons.  But it'll cause two others--a child who is a sleep risk from 4pm through 7pm, particularly if we drive anywhere (which could bring back the problem of the late nights); and the loss of my productive block of time on weekend afternoons.  I'm not quite sure what to do about those issues right now, but we may not have a choice.  For now I guess we have to stick with the status quo and see if this is just a phase, but if it's not, we need to be prepared to ditch the beloved nap.  I never thought we'd have to part ways so early...but we shall see.

As a final side note, this is post #1,400!  If I do some quick math, that averages out to one post every two days, which is pretty impressive!  I've talked about an awful lot of parenting problems and shared a ton of memories over the past eight-plus years, and it's amazing this has gone on so long when so many other blogs have faded away.  But I've said before that this is my therapy, a place to vent and talk through things, and apparently I still need that outlet, all these years later!  I'm pretty sure life would be one big blur without it, too, so thank goodness for this priceless memory preserver!

A Little Better?

Well, we had another lackluster-ish weekend.  It was still pretty productive on my end and, to be fair, I didn't go with Craig and Jacob to Jacob's teammate's birthday party, so at least Jacob got to play mini-golf and arcade games.  He came home excited about adding seven more army guys to his collection courtesy of prize tickets, and despite being hesitant about going, he seemed to enjoy himself.  So at least someone had a good time!  Jacob had a lacrosse game Saturday morning, where he scored one goal and contributed to another.  I spent that afternoon doing my most dreaded of household tasks--trimming the bushes.  All fingers stayed intact, and while I was sore yesterday, I survived.  I made a little more progress in Carter's room, hanging a couple of his new decorations and patching and painting a couple spots on the walls.  I still need to make a final decision about the setup of his room, the furniture, and the placement of some of the other new decorations, but we're getting there.

We were going to do something fun Saturday night, but we had to get a gift for yesterday's party and that seemed to pretty much suck the fun out of it after chasing kids around and making two bathroom runs in one trip to Target.  The boys got a little outside time here and there, though.  My next post will be about what I've decided is completely ruining our mojo right now when it comes to weekend plans.  But for now...

Since I don't have many pictures from the weekend, we'll do a bit of a throwback to a couple weeks ago when Carter got to play on the playground at Jacob's lacrosse game.  Man, I wish our home field had a playground, but the road games have been fun. 

He LOVES slides!  Even though he tends to hold on for dear life :)

This was a bigger metal slide and he was pretty excited climbing the stairs by himself...

See, holding on for dear life!  But it was fast and he loved it!

Back in our seats, I tried to take a picture of him, and he was playing peek-a-boo with me instead!

I also wanted to share a couple cute videos from a couple weeks ago when I tried to get him to do a couple of the little story song things he has learned at daycare.  I guess you could title this first one as, "Perils of Recording Near a Television":

But he finally got a different one out...at least one verse of it...

Fast-forward to this weekend, and here is my sweet little man with his lawn mower...

He was such a man on a mission with that thing, and it was cracking me up.  For a while we didn't think the bubbler was working on it so we didn't have bubbles in, but I made it a point this year to give it a shot again, and he's been loving it!

Lately we've definitely been picking up on Carter's annoyance when Jacob and Daddy get to do something together and he gets left out.  It's hard--sometimes it's just easier for the two of them to do something and not have Carter in the way, which would inevitably make Jacob crazy and cause everything to fall apart.  But I know that as he gets older, Carter is only going to get more frustrated about being left out, no matter how much fun he and I have together.  He always wants to be outside when the big boys are out there, and I think Jacob's gotten a little more accustomed to having Carter out there, especially if he wants to play lacrosse.  He still may not like it, but he's expressed frustration at the thought of Carter potentially not wanting to play lacrosse as he gets older, so perhaps he understands that including him might be the best way to do it.  Craig captured this amazing picture of both of them (smiling!) last night...

And even better, he got this video which perfectly captures life around our house these days...lacrosse, weird sibling interactions, and lots of noise!  And the tornado/tomato reference is because the skies were stormy looking and Carter called a tornado a "tormato", which gave us all a good laugh!



Hopefully we will finally get to more exciting weekends soon.  We're getting closer to Jacob's birthday, so one way or another things will get more interesting!  Summer is waiting for us and we need to get in the game!

A Bit of a Bust

Memorial Day weekend always seems to be the beginning of the summertime "pressure" I feel to do fun things and take advantage of the good weather.  This year has been a bit of an odd one, weather-wise, as the weather stayed cold extra long and any weekends that were decent in temperature either ended up being rainy or too busy.  I just felt like it was too easy to get behind this year because we didn't have that "false alarm" week of warm weather to get us going on transitioning life over to summer.  I couldn't change over my closet or the kids' closets because we needed the long sleeves right up until it was suddenly 65+ degrees every day.  I couldn't really go out and do early season clearing and weeding in the yard because it was always cold and/or rainy, and suddenly it was consistently warm and all of the foliage exploded at the same time.  And because I wasn't out there immediately, I was immediately very behind.  With lots of evenings taken up by Jacob's sports, plus my Corporate Challenge training, plus all of this transitioning of Carter's room, I just felt like evenings were already too crammed and weekends were getting chewed up too fast, so nothing got done when it felt like it should have.  Consequently, I kept putting everything off until Memorial Day weekend, when I would have three whole days (plus a little extra time Friday afternoon) to get it all done.  HA.

To be fair, I did pretty well cutting down my list.  I cleared out a couple piles of stuff that I'd set aside after Carter's room transition.  I completely reorganized his clothes so the summer stuff was more readily available.  I reorganized my shoe storage for the same reason.  I went to Lowe's on Saturday morning to buy mulch, garden soil, and plants for my garden.  I dripped in sweat just doing the buying, thanks to the hot, humid weather, then drenched myself further while putting down mulch, planting my garden, and trying to trim the out-of-control, diseased tree near our patio that was constantly hitting me in the head.  I accomplished a lot, in part because Carter's nap and the outside stuff won out over Jacob's baseball game.  I couldn't fathom letting Carter skip a nap just to sit out in the heat for a baseball game he wasn't going to want to watch, so he slept and I gardened instead.  I hate missing games, but I think that one was for a pretty valid reason.  That evening we went shopping for decor for Carter's room (good browsing, but no buying...yet) and went out to dinner.  Saturday was definitely a full day.

Sunday we went to my aunt and uncle's house here in town for our annual family picnic. Jacob honestly wasn't thrilled about going ("I'll be bored!") but the boys actually played some lacrosse together!  Eventually the rain came and forced us all inside for dinner.  Carter fell asleep sitting up while eating dinner, thanks to skipping his nap, and it wasn't until he woke up a half hour later that we realized he still had a piece of hot dog bun in his mouth!  He must have been really tired!

Monday just ended up being a lazy day.  I wanted to do more, but it just didn't happen.  I was hoping to do something fun with the kids, but there was just some lacrosse outside for Jacob, some puttering around the house for me, and a final family trip to BJ's to stock up on a couple things before we let our membership expire.  Blah.

There wasn't really anything photo-worthy from the weekend, so I felt like I sort of failed us as a family on that front.  Memorial Day weekend is usually the beginning of weeks of activity and a great time to get a head start on the summer bucket list.  But alas, this one was lacking a bit.  I got done the things I had to do to maintain my sanity, but perhaps I should have made some other things higher priorities.  I need to do better, but my energy level and to do list make it hard sometimes.  Not to mention that naptime is usually in the way, and getting a full slate of willing participants in this house is not easy.  But hopefully it will get better.

We started out the week with a couple restless nights of sleep from Carter.  At first we thought it was just gas because he whined in his sleep then woke up having to poop the first night, then kept passing gas in his sleep last night.  But last night when he woke up at 1am to pee, he said to me, "My eyes are wet," and when I looked, his eyes were all gooey.  I put in a couple drops from when he last had pinkeye, just in case, but when he woke up this morning and I finished cleaning them off, I realized his eyes weren't red and they didn't ooze any more.  I still called the doctor and got him in, which was convenient since I was ready to take him in anyway because he's had cold symptoms for weeks.  I started him on allergy medicine last week to see if it would help, but he's still congested.  So am I, for that matter, so it's hard to tell.  But the doctor found a borderline ear infection, so he's on antibiotics for a bit.  I almost started wondering if he could have a sinus infection and maybe it decided to drain through his eyes for some reason.  Or maybe all that outside time last night at Jacob's game put his allergies on alert.  Either way, I'm hoping he gets better soon.  I need sleep!   

Never a dull moment around here...well, except for Memorial Day, I guess...

I Don't Hate My Body, But...

...I mostly just don't like how it looks in clothes.  Sounds like a technicality, but I promise, it's not.

I've gained quite a bit of weight in the last year.  It may only be about five to seven pounds, depending on the day, but on a 5'2" frame, that is not a good thing.  I have no idea what the problem is, as I don't feel that my eating habits or activity level have changed considerably.  Perhaps it's just age and the beginning of a slowing metabolism.  Maybe it's a symptom of my PCOS becoming more apparent.  I know exercising has been a struggle, but even over the last month as I ran twice a week, it didn't seem to make a difference.  I've been on two new medications for the last year or so, one for my cholesterol and one for my reflux, so maybe they're causing me to hold on to weight?  I don't know.  It's probably just that I have been eating more, but man, that seems pretty extreme.

It's actually at the point where clothes have stopped fitting.  Some of my jeans are awfully tight, my summer go-to khaki skort (looks like a skirt but is mom-crouch-friendly!) creates a massive muffin top, and a couple other shirts and dresses just catch my stomach wrong.  For the first time I can tell that everything on my body is bigger, not just my stomach or chest.  My calves no longer look as slim and toned (even after weeks of running), my arms are bigger, and back fat is becoming an issue.  I used to be able to suck in and at least pretend to be skinny, but now there's a pocket of fat above my belly button that just won't hide.  I thought I had dodged a bullet when my baby weight eventually went away--even if my body wasn't quite the same--but apparently age is even more powerful than childbearing.

The thing is, while I'm not thrilled with what I see in the mirror, I have that respect for my body that so many mommy bloggers talk about--the one that knows the miracles my body did, that it carried two babies, pushed them into the world, fed them, and somehow (mostly) recovered.  Outside of the context of real life and what it once was, it's fine.  It's a survivor, so to speak.  But when I realize how much it has changed and how difficult it is making it to get dressed every morning, it's a bummer.

The elliptical was supposed to be the savior for both of us, but that still hasn't happened for a couple reasons.  Hopefully it will, but it's been a big decision.  Even still, twice-a-week exercise--which usually works wonders--did nothing in the last month, and that concerns me.  It's only going to get harder as I get older, so it's pretty daunting right now.  I refuse to go all diet crazy.  I can certainly watch what I eat, but I refuse to spend the rest of my life not eating ice cream and French fries.  It's already hard enough working around Jacob's diet for our family meals, so I can't restrict much further without losing my mind.  It's just not sustainable.  But I can make better choices about snacks and meals out, though I still don't foresee that being the magic bullet to drop five pounds any time soon. 

The rolls don't make me happy, but I swear, I don't usually look at my body with hatred.  I am a little resentful that it's chosen to start aging and hasn't brought weight moderation along for the ride, but for now I can respect the curves (and even like some of them) because I wouldn't be a mom without them.  They're a symbol of the sacrifices I made to carry two kids.  Sometimes they're even a reminder of my mom and how she has traveled along much the same path ahead of me.  So while I don't hate them or what they stand for, I do hate that they're impacting my life and my wardrobe as much as they are.  I want to feel good about myself and right now there's a lot working against that.  I need to find a way to beat this, but most of the time right now I'm just too darn tired to think of much else.  So I will continue to set aside the too-small stuff right now and hope I figure out how to welcome them back to the fold another time.  For my sake and the sake of my kids, it's just too important to ignore.

Baby Gear Exodus

So...the crib is gone and so far the big boy bed has been going okay.  Carter is sort of confused by his new freedom, actually.  At night he seems to have a hard time going to bed.  He's got a few of the usual excuses, but he mostly just sits in bed and talks to himself.  But he does it for a while and seems to routinely be staying up until 10pm.  Ugh.  But once in a while he will get out of bed, and the other night while we were watching TV, I heard him close his door.  No idea why.  He did that in the middle of the night after peeing a couple nights earlier, too.  In the middle of the night and early in the morning, he still calls out to us about having to pee, and even though I talk through the monitor and tell him to get up and go and I will meet him there, more often than not I have to walk down there and escort him.  And even though I moved the color-changing night light clock into his room, he's still not entirely clear on the green vs. yellow colors and their meanings.  We're working on it.

But the setup of his room is definitely growing on me!  I figured on Sunday that it would at least be a good temporary setup, but I like it!  There's so much more floor space, and neither the closet nor the dresser cabinet are blocked by other things.  I do wish the little rocking chair could be in his room, but I sort of like having the bean bag chair in there better, because I can totally see him snuggling in to read a book!  I still have to decide about furniture, if I'm going to buy new stuff, and if so, will the room need another redo to accommodate it?  I could just get a bed to match the existing dresser, but it's not as big as a full six drawer one.  Or I could go with a more mature looking darker wood for both.  I'm not sure the bed will fit in any part of the room if I get a bookshelf headboard, so I might just have to stick with the platform/storage base and leave it at that.  And I really need to start working on big boy decor, as I've taken down most of the beloved Baby Snoopy stuff.  We need new stuff to fill the walls, but I am torn.  Sports stuff is easy, will match the bed, and will grow with him, but he also really likes superheroes and vehicles, but those don't always age well.  Hobby Lobby has some cute stuff--tin signs and even superhero-ish cartoon phrases on canvas ("Pow!") that might be okay, but I have to keep thinking, I guess.  He's definitely more broad in his interests than Jacob, so it's hard to focus on a cohesive theme without the risk he will move on to something else before he outgrows it.

It was definitely bittersweet disassembling the crib.  Knowing that it's been nearly eight years since we first assembled it with me nearly nine months pregnant in a very hot house, and sweating through the disassembly equally tired after my three-mile run, brought back memories.  The crib we registered for was in a pre-recall phase, and after waiting for a bit we ended up just finding a set online from Walmart, relatively cheap but nice looking and with all of the features we wanted.  It was such a relief to get it to our house and get it assembled, so we knew we had some semblance of a real baby room.  It definitely seemed to make it all much more real!

The crib had to be disassembled when we moved, then converted to a toddler bed right around Jacob's third birthday.  We skipped that step with Carter because none of the bed rail solutions seemed ideal and he still wasn't climbing out.  But if you add in a half dozen lowerings of the crib base to two assemblies and two conversions, plus lots of bedding changes, I have spent a lot of time intimately acquainted with the hardware of that crib.  And that's not even getting into the hours I have spent hanging over the side of the crib trying to soothe little boys to sleep, or sitting on the floor and sticking my arm through the rails to rub a back or a head.  So many hours...tired, desperate hours.  I still remember the difficulty/excitement of picking out that crib mattress, too, of all things.  And now all of it is in our crawl space, in pieces and without purpose for the first time in nearly eight years.

And of course, now I'm faced with a challenge.  What do I do with everything?  We have so much baby stuff, and no more babies coming to use it.  But I still live in fear that the second that stuff leaves my house, I will somehow find myself miraculously pregnant.  Even still, I'm a bit hesitant to do a yard sale (people are creepy and dishonest, and it's a lot of work), but it also seems like a waste to just give it all away, especially because a lot of it is in good shape.  I probably need to look into consignment for some of it, but it's overwhelming regardless.  There are lots of memories, so it's going to be hard to give it all up.  I definitely want to reclaim that space, because I currently feel a little overwhelmed by the amount of stuff in our house, but I feel paralyzed when it comes to doing anything about it.  What do you keep?  There are some instant keepers and plenty of stuff that I don't have a major attachment to, but I know there's going to be a lot of in-between stuff--stuff with no purpose and/or minimal significance that for whatever reason holds a memory strong enough that it's hard to part with.

Last night at my mom's group, another mom and I were discussing this exact topic.  I had mentioned that Carter had moved to a big boy bed, and she actually started talking about the process of getting rid of baby stuff.  She and I were both in the same boat--hesitant to do it, but knowing it needs to be done.  She said one of the same things I keep thinking--once it's done, it's so...FINAL.  And that part is hard, no matter how much I know a third baby would be a disaster in our house, for so many reasons.  I've gotten much more settled with that reality in recent months, but the physical action is still this big step that makes my heart ache.  It's nice to know I'm not alone, but I'm still overwhelmed with the task. 

Tonight I worked through a couple piles that had been waiting for me all week.  I remade Jacob's bed with new sheets and his new striped quilt, then washed his sports one in preparation for putting it on Carter's bed tomorrow.  But I still have a bunch of stuff that needs to be cleared out of Carter's room, and I think the changing table pad is going in the trash.  It is practically flat, so that can go!  But I still have so much more to think about and do, and while I have three days to do it, it's not going to be nearly enough!  But let's see how we do...

Weekend of Firsts!

We had a good weekend!  Of course, it started out by finding out on Thursday that my Great-Aunt Lois had passed away.  She was my mom's aunt, the last of her generation, and she was 90.  She'd fallen last week, and she was ready to go to heaven.  So while it was sad, it was a blessing.  With that in mind, I needed to work on finishing my work on Friday so I could take off today for the funeral.  And with a ton of stuff on my list for the weekend, I had to try to cram in as much as I could so I could leave Sunday and make it in for the viewing. 

I started checking off my list Friday night by sorting through Carter's artwork and taking pictures.  I snagged this mask because I realized I never had him model it for me, and this picture cracked me up!

When I put him to bed that night, we had two "lasts"...last time reading in the chair in his room, and last time going to bed in a crib!  Saturday was going to be the big day of moving his bed into his room!  But first, we had Jacob's first lacrosse tournament!  His team has gone to "Lax at the Lake" for the last two years, but because of schedules I would have had to do it alone and I just couldn't fathom it.  But this year things were looking good.  The weather all week looked good, and then suddenly when I checked it on Friday, that area--which is quite a bit southeast of us--was set to have cooler, rainy weather.  Noooo.  We also went back and forth all week about getting a hotel, as it's a 90 minute drive and we had to be there at 7:30am.  But the rooms were expensive and some not that close anyway, so we just sucked it up and woke up at the crack of dawn.  I was up at 5am, Craig at 5:15, Jacob by 5:30, and Carter at 5:45.  We dragged ourselves out the door a little after 6am and started the drive.  It was a little highway driving and a lot of country roads, out into the middle of the Finger Lakes. 

It was cool and damp when we got there, but we settled in and tried to keep warm.  It wasn't awful, but it wasn't pleasant either.  At least the view was nice...

Green hills

Jacob scored the tying goal in game #1, which was nice to see.  After the first game, we headed up to the snack tent to fuel up for game #2.  Luckily I thought ahead and brought gluten-free donuts becaue I saw that donuts were one of the snacks teammates were bringing. 

A teammate's parents own a fabulous donut place, and this is what they brought for the rest of the kids!

Lacrosse donuts!

Game two marked the team's first win of the year!  Also, my mom game to see that game.  She happened to be in Rochester for a weekend reunion with her college dorm mates, and she and her good friend (often referred to as Colin's grandma in this blog a while back) made the hour drive to come watch.  By then the cold had dissipated a bit, which took the edge off.  The rain held off and it started to get a little brighter.  During break #2, we took a team picture...

Jacob is right in front of the coach on the right

By game #3 we were a little disappointed in his playing time overall, but he seemed to be putting in a good effort.  We're wondering if he's just not listening to the coach, or what. 

Digging for the ball...he has a black helmet with red straps

His team tied another game and it was finally time to head out.  Overall it wasn't a bad day!  I wouldn't want to do it in really cold or really hot weather, but it was fun!  We drove to a Pizza Hut in town where we knew we could get gluten-free pizza, had lunch, and headed home.  Clearly it was a busy start to the day!

When we got home, I had a hard time dragging myself out of my chair.  I wasn't feeling great (not sure if it was exhaustion or what), but eventually I dragged myself up and we all went out for frozen yogurt for dinner.  It was part of a week-long fundraiser for school and $5 maximum night.  When we got home, I started working on the big boy bed.  I disassembled the crib, moved all of the pieces to the basement, and then Craig and I started bringing up the pieces for the bed--a basic bed frame, a box spring, the new mattress, and a bed rail.  Plus I had to make the bed.  It was pretty tiring, but eventually it was ready!  The room was super cramped and needed a complete overhaul Sunday, but at least Carter got to sleep in it!  The giggle he put out when he saw the finished product was super cute!

Well, he went down fine, but when I went in to check on him for the second time right before I went to bed, I was stunned when he was nowhere to be found!  It took me a few seconds to realize he was curled up in the tiny space you see on the bottom right of the picture above.  His feet were against the wall, he was all curled up, and he was halfway under the bed!  I have no idea how he got there.  He was sleeping in bed last time I checked him, and then he was on the floor.  The bed rail was pretty high up, but there was still a good for or so of space (about equal to the pillow's width) at the top of the bed, and all I can figure is that he tried to snuggle up on the pillow, rolled off, and somehow slipped past the bar to the floor.  There was only a small space, though, so he could have bumped into the side of the bookshelf...but we didn't hear any cries and he didn't seem injured, so we're just not sure.  We moved the bed rail up further on the bed, and he's been fine since.  Crazy.

I had Carter nap in the Pack 'n' Play in our room on Sunday so I could work in his room.  He was resistant but eventually fell asleep.  I spent a couple hours just rearranging his room.  I moved the bookshelf across the room under the window, moved out our reading chair, its footrest, and a small rocking chair (it used to be mine!), moved a small table from under the window to next to the bed, and moved the soccer ball bean bag chair from Jacob's room to Carter's, since Jacob indicated he was ready to give it up.  So now Carter has a reading corner and a lot more floor space to play.  It'll work for now.  I'm still thinking about moving his bed under the window to open up more wall space for the dresser.  There's not much room regardless, but it's so much better.  I also cleared out a ton of baby stuff and took down the bumper I was using as a wall decoration.  Most of it is sitting in a couple piles to clear out/put away, but it's a start.  I still need to decide on furniture and big boy decorations.  I did find a new quilt for Jacob's bed (plain stripes) so Carter is getting the sports bedding.  He's also getting some sweet Spider-man sheets, so I think his décor might be eclectic!

After the room redo I had to quickly pack a bag and change my clothes so I could head to Buffalo for my great-aunt's funeral.  It was a nice opportunity to see family I haven't seen in a while, including my aunt and uncle from Wisconsin, who are still struggling with their grief after their daughter's sudden death last month.  Obviously it was for a tough reason (again), but family time is so important.  I spent the night at my parents', and the funeral was this morning.  I ran a couple errands on my way home, and we had a pleasant evening at home.  We have another busy week on deck--my race tomorrow (finally), lacrosse Wednesday, baseball game or lacrosse practice Thursday, baseball Saturday, family picnic Sunday.  So much to do!  

Which means it is definitely time for bed!  More soon!