Saturday, April 30, 2011

Stuff my kid says

Tonight while tucking Jasper in for bed I gave him his normal 'magic kisses.' He has to have them done, by me, before every nap and bed time. It's special kisses done in a certain order, covering his whole face, and they can't be wiped off while he is sleeping.

While giving him his magic kisses I was filled with overwhelming sadness with the thought that someday, he will no longer want, need or require me to give him his magic kisses before bed.

I said something like 'Think you will have your wife give your magic kisses before bed when you are older Jasper"

My sweetheart of a son replied with "Yes! But you have to still give me my magic kisses too."

I said, "Well I might not be able to every night because you will live with your wife, but every time I see you i will."

And then he said " But you will live with me too. You have to."

This made me so incredibly happy and sad at the same time.

This brought on the conversation of me moving in and taking care of his babies when he has them and he thought that was a great idea and claimed that he was going to have 5 babies.

I'm sure all mothers feel this way, but he truly is the most special person in the whole world, and I'm quite positive no woman will ever be good enough for him.

Friday, April 29, 2011

I got pretty emotional today while watching the Royal Wedding. But not for the reason most people got emotional about.

I got emotional thinking about Princess Diana, and her not being there for her sons wedding. And then I started thinking about Jasper's wedding. And I just sort of lost it.

Imagining the man he will one day become. The bride he will one day have. I almost can't handle the thought. Can't imagine him leaving me one day, and starting his own family. He's my best friend, and him choosing some one else over me one day? I seriously lose it. I know it will happen. And it's natural and Should happen. But I can't help getting really emotional thinking about his wedding day. And my heart breaks for Princess Diana that she didn't get to be there to witness her baby becoming a husband.

BFF's

Thursday, April 28, 2011

What's for lunch?

I'm glad you asked (okay, so nobody asked, but I'm sharing anyway)



Eating healthier on our game on diet is turning out to not be so bad. This is what I'm eating for lunch and dinner- lots of yummy romaine and spinach topped w/ just a bit of cheese and ceasar dressing and a baked potato with some vegan butter, pepper and white cheddar popcorn seasoning ( SO good for some extra flavor) and for dinner I eat the same and add a grilled chicken breast. Breakfast is greek yogurt w/ blueberries mixed in and a hard boiled egg- and when I need something to snack on I eat an apple and some crackers and cheese and a few cashews. Not bad at all!!

Oh and you probably can't tell by the picture- but I got a facial the other night- and my skin feels and looks amazing! It's seriously so smooth and soft. I also got a an hour full body massage- two hours of pampering was PURE BLISS and just what I needed.

Looking back- Newborn Jasper

 August 3, 2007. Hours after Jasper was born.
Tired mamma and tired baby. Those indentions by his eye and his forehead were from the forcepts used after 3.5 hours of pushing and still no baby. Poor guy had a black eye for a week!

First night home- sleeping in the bassinet used by his dad, uncles and grandpa. His grandpa (Drew's dad) is an identical twin and they both slept in here as newborns. THen it was passed to Drew's dad when he had kids since he was the oldest and the first to have kids, and then Jasper was the first great grandchild- so he slept in there as well, for the first 2 months.





Looking back at these pictures makes me miss baby Jasper So much.

How did he go from this.....
to this?

Wednesday, April 27, 2011

Seriously Best. Salad. Ever.



Last week I was researching some different salads, and found a recipe that sounded AMAAAZING. I substituted a few things and this is what we came up with. 

chicken on the grill, marinated in organic sun dried tomato dressing (i threw in oregano)

romaine lettuce

feta cheese

black lives

red pepper- on the grill

throw it all together- add a tiny bit sauce and a little sun dried tomato dressing

It was seriously the best salad I've ever had in my life I think. And my husband did most of the work. 


He also grilled some asparagus and threw that on the plate as well. Doesn't that just look so delicious? 

Tuesday, April 26, 2011

Game on

Diet that is. Yesterday I got a text from hubbs saying

"60ish days till Sweden. 20 lbs to lose- wanna do the game on diet with me"

Last January a couple of my friends and I did the Game On! Diet- I also had Drew on it. My friends and I lost between 5-10 lbs each in 4 weeks- and Drew lost about 20. Over thee past year he has gained most of it back and apparently wants to go back on it!

I figured why not- it's not an extreme diet- it's basically just about eating healthier meals. There's a whole chapter on food- and I'm not going to go too much into detail- but I'll post our progress here! We are doing out first official weigh in tonight, and then will start tomorrow. Wish us luck!!

Monday, April 25, 2011

Easter Weekend

 Saturday was the first time I was able to walk around a bit- and good timing since we were headed to a HUGE easter egg hunt in Wash Park. A local church put on an egg hunt for the kiddos and set out 15000 eggs!!

                                             Waiting patiently for the hunt to begin.



This egg hunt was for pre-schoolers (elem. school was later) so I was shocked to see how intense some of these parents were!! There were moms that pushed their strollers in and were scooping up dozens of eggs and throwing them at the bottom of their basket. This was supposed to be fun for the KIDS, and here you are showing your stroller in front of 3 year olds so you can get as many eggs as possible? Pathetic. Seriously pathetic.

 This mom was running so fast her toddler went flying! This girl was in tears and the mom started yelling GET THE EGGS. Seriously? I couldn't believe she thought getting a few free plastic toys was worth having her daughter's knees skinned and in tears.


Jasper had such a fun afternoon, and loves his little plastic toys he got.

 Jasper was SO excited when he woke up SUnday morning and realized the Easter bunny had come for a visit while he was sleeping. And brought ALL of the free willy movies!! His favorite.
 Opening his Easter package his grammy (my mom) had sent form Iowa.
 I asked Jasper to pick up that plastic bag (which i conveniently dropped) so he could find the note the Easter bunny left in the kitty door. He was SO excited and kept shouting "Easter bunny wrote my name!!" (since he knows how to write his name he could see that the note said Jasper)
                                          Look mom- he left one on the fire hydrant!!

After the egg hunt I was too busy to remember to take pictures. Fail but we had a Fabulous Easter Sunday.

After our egg hunt I made us my delicious Swedish pancakes- which we ate while snuggling on the couch and watching Free Willy 3, then we headed to our PO box where Jasper had another Easter package waiting from his other grandparents. After a starbucks run it was park time.

The rest of the afternoon consisted of Jasper napping while we cleaned up and prepared for our grill out. We invited all of our friends that don't have any family here. We don't have family here, but at least we have the three of us. Our friends don't even have that! So they all came to celebrate with us. I'm still not sure How we managed to fit 8 adults and Jasper into our little living room since it started pouring right after we started the grill- but it was cozy and fun and we ate delicious burgers, hot dogs, fries, salad, asparagus, grilled red pepper (YUM) and different cakes. I didn't get a single picture of any of this- but in my defense I had a Lot to do!

Hope everyone had as great of an Easter weekend as we did!

Saturday, April 23, 2011

He's a keeper

My husband.

Tuesday I rolled my ankle- while carrying the 25+lb one year old I nanny. I tore my ligaments 60-80%, whatever that means, and a few hours it looked like this.

Cute huh?

The first day/night the pain was the worst. After that it's just been difficult to walk on (have it in a brace to prevent further tearing, which apparently would be no bueno. When Drew's been home, he has been waiting on me hand and food. After a 9-10 hour work day, he has been walking to Whole Foods and then coming home and making us all dinner. Then we put J to bed and he cleans the kitchen, and toys and such that he insists I not put away during the day.

 And Tuesday night- when I was in the most pain, he brought me home my favorite treat, pepsi and twix, which I enjoyed while he cooked me dinner and I sat icing my ankle.

Add caption
 Delicious home made pizza and ceaser salad he made one night- see told you he was a keeper!
 Jasper has been having 'sympathy pains' and has been walking around with two of his father's socks on one his right foot, 'cuz i got's an owie like mamma'
This picture was taken two nights ago, so two days after I fell. The swelling is mostly gone (thanks to all those bags of ice Drew forced on me) but it's still extremely tender and turning  sweet shades of black, purple and green (def. more bruising now then in this picture)

On a completely unrelated note- seeing this pictures of my tattoo makes me realize how much it has faded, anyone know how often you should touch them up? It's only been 2 years since I got mine, but it's definitely  a much duller purple than when I got it in Sweden two summers ago.

Friday, April 22, 2011

Shoes, glorious shoooeeeessssss

Sung to the tune of ' food, glorious foooooooood' from Ice Age.

For a few weeks I've been on the look out for a pair of really good, comfortable walking shoes. Mainly for our trip to Sweden this summer, because I will be walking around all day most days (one reason why I LOVE Europe.)

I have the most comfortable tennis shoes that i wear on long walks- but let's face it, I will be wearing lot's of cute summer dresses, and my tennis shoes added won't exactly make for a cute outfit.

I also have a couple pair of nice leather sandals that I love to wear with dresses and can walk just fine in them for a long time. But this is Sweden in the summer, rain during our 2 week stay is inevitable, and leather sandals + rain, puddles don't mix.

Two weekends ago we were at the mall and I decided to take a look through The Walking Company. I ended up finding TWO pairs that I loved, were super comfortable AND relatively cute. I ended up going with a pair of taos. Apparently I have a super high arch- and need the added support.

Last Friday they finally arrived- and I decided to test them out at the zoo on Saturday. Normally I wouldn't try out new shoes if I'm going to be walking in them for hours at a time the first time- but these were Perfect! Unbelievably comfortable. After hours at the zoo pushing Jasper in the stroller, having part of Jasper's juice spilled on the front of them- they held up amazingly. Comfortable- cute-durable. What more could I want in a shoe??



I think these shoes will serve me well when I'm walking around Stockholm this summer.

Thursday, April 21, 2011

Apartment Hunting: Stockholm

Okay so it's a little premature, but it's almost a guarantee that we will move to Sweden in the future. Hopefully in a year but probably more like 2 years. So yes, it's a little early to be apartment shopping- but i love looking at real estate. And I really love looking at real estate in Sweden.

They have such crisp, clean, WHITE, modern homes. Usually with so much less clutter than American homes. I can spend hours looking at booli.se searching for our future dream home. I'm going to start featuring some of the homes I find on here. Maybe no one else interested at all- if so, feel free to skip over these posts :) But if nothing at least you can look at some pretty pictures!

Today's Swedish home is an apartment right in Stockholm. It's located in the Sodermalm area, where supposedly actor Stellan Skarsgard lives. It's also the place where much of The Girl W/ The Dragon Tattoo trilogy(LOVE those books) takes places.

 View from the neighborhood- across the water is Gamla stan- and all the great shopping. It's just a 15 minute boat ride or i think maybe a 20 min bus ride (last time i was there i took the boat, not the bus so I'm not positive on the time)
 Lovely, bright living room. Not huge, but definitely big enough.
 View from living room. Love all the windows.
 Eat in Kitchen. Obviously.
 Bedroom/playroom. Jasper would be in heaven in this room.
 Love all white rooms. Especially bathrooms. Just looks so CLEAN. And there is a washer/dryer in there as well. Big bonus!
 Balcony's in a city make me Oh so happy.



 View from balcony- I'd never want to leave!
 So much natural light. Another that that makes this mamma so happy.
 Little playground in the court yard, but Jasper would have more fun exploring on those rocks, and playing in the sand.

And we would get to enjoy this on our daily walks.

Okay this was just supposed to be for fun, but I want to pack up and move to this apartment RIGHT NOW!

**This apartment is listed at $534,000 eeek! And not only that, even after buying the apartment we would still have to pay $650 a month, sort of like an HOA fee.