One of these things doesn't look like the other

I looked up from working the other day and realized I had cute baby socks sitting on my work. I figured I should capture it...as I'm sure the items scattered over my desk will change over the months and years.

Budgeting...toddler-style

As I've been tightening our belts one dollar at a time, my lovely 2 1/2 yr old added to our monthly budget in toiletries today...here's the tally as of 8:22pm

• bottle of "special" lotion to calm roseacea...$50
• bottle of Aspen cologne...no idea of price, I think it was Matt's from Junior High...not too upset about this one except the fact that the house smells like a boys junior high locker
• 1/2 bottle hand soap
• Entire bottle of my only "non-cheap" shampoo (I mention this because there was 3 other cheap bottles she could have chosen). The only way I knew she was dumping it out was the song of "bubbles, bubbles, I love bubbles" from the mid-day bath she was taking to wash her "ouchy"butt that had soaked in aformentioned liquids earlier while I was mopping more of aformentioned items off floor.
• 1/4 roll of toilet paper
• 2 razors (only after she "shaved my face like Daddy". Yes, there was blood. )
• 1/4 bottle of hand sanitizer
• 1/4 bottle lotion

Luckily she did not get into the other side of the medicine cabinet...so I guess our toddler proofing needs to increase it's height restriction.Hope you're having a happy Tuesday. This face cheered me up...

blue love

blue, originally uploaded by Erica and Ryan.

I had the greatest valentines day. We made english muffins and apple/carrot/lemon juice.
And this guy spent all day telling me he loved me and hugging me. Sweet Ryan.
I've been pretty stressed lately. I am super busy with work. So much that it feels like I won't be able to finish it all. It is actually affecting my sleep. Which is bad because us mommies need to capitalize on the moments we have to sleep. Then he insists that if I'm feeling stressed and can't sleep, I need to wake him up. I did, he rubs my back and bam...I'm asleep.
Today I feel very rested. So I think I should remind myself of somethings I love right now.
- Mali's little coos and sounds she's making...all the time. Oh, and her laughs and her smiles.
- The decaf coffee we brought back from Hawaii
- the faint chaco tan I have on my feet from 8 days spent in the sun
-sunny february days like today that remind me March is right around the corner. I love March.

Just a little overwhelmed...

As I sit here listening to our first African-American President, I am consumed with emotion…Yes I could still consider myself post-partum even with an 11 month-old, and I am moved by the sound of my husband and daughters “making tea” and chasing each other around the house as I make them dinner out of my first cast-iron Dutch oven given to me by my remarkable mother-in-law…but I am crying… and now to make things more inspired, my sister just called to inform me she got into Berkely’s School of Journalism…her dream school…
I am so damn proud of my little sister who thought she came from a family of mice, ran away from home with only her teddy bear weekly, and generally has been trying to save the world from an early age. And that my 62-yr-old mother is doing her first triathlon this year with myself and 4 other 30-something friends.
In this era of amazing change and compromise, and of course in my developmental I’m-30-and-have-kids-and-care-about-the-world decade, I am amazed by our complexities…and the simplicity of my 2 year old shoving Burt’s Bees in my face and asking “Shall we put on lipstick, Mommy?” Or how enthralled Logan, Matt and I were about how cool it looks when ice cracks under your feet on the Missoula Osprey’s baseball field as the pink sky reflected off Mount Jumbo and Sentinal reminding us what a beautiful place we live in. Or the pride and contentment I feel finding out that Logan got into the Preschool that we wanted to start in the Fall (and how amazed I am that my little suckling baby will turn 3 in 6 months)…Oh, how the life we live flys by and only a couple years from now I will look back with a much different perspective and of course 20/20 vision.