My third grade school picture is really bad.  Not in that way where I'm still cute but it was an awkward moment.  As in, that way where you question whether my parents displayed the photo in their home, or kept my second grade photo up for two years.  (They did the latter, as I recall.)

They do "school pictures" at Jack's daycare, which I find funny.  Not because I don't consider it a school, because I do and it is.  But because, well...they're still babies.  I mean -- Jack's a toddler, yes.  He is no longer an infant.  But he's still at the age where it's acceptable to count his age in months.  And he doesn't have extracurricular activities, unless he's the president of some Yo Gabba Gabba club or Pooping Your Pants club that I don't know about.

Anyway, here are the proofs:

Who are you and why are you taking my picture?

Are you sure I should be sitting in these fake leaves?

Is this cute enough to make you stop?

I'm pretty sure I am going to purchase a few prints of that last one.  I mean, the one in which he looks like an (almost ginger, by the way) Irish hooligan whose soccer team just lost the game.  

Does that mean they're all headed down the pub for sippies of milk?

I bet it does,

Heather

Thanksgiving by the Numbers

Turkeys I cooked this year for Thanksgiving:  0

Turkeys I purchased from Central Market to reheat and serve:  1

Ranking of the quality of that turkey, on a scale of 1 to 10:  10

Number of pictures I took this Thanksgiving:  0

Number of pies I baked this Thanksgiving:  5 (4 pumpkin; 1 cherry)

Number of large pieces of pumpkin pie Jack ate in one sitting:  2

Number of pieces he would have eaten if we hadn't cut him off:  Unknown

Number of guests we had for Thanksgiving:  5  (Grammy, Pop, Cristy, Dagwood, and Schatzi, their adorable dog)

Number of nicknames we considered for Cristy:  1.  She is now known to Jack as "Kiki."

Number of nicknames we considered for Dagwood:  0.  Jack has, practically enough, simply shortened his name to "Dag."

Number of books read to Jack by Dag and Pop this weekend:  Unknown.

Photo by Dag.  Because I didn't take any, remember?

Hope your Thanksgiving numbers are off the charts, too.

Heather

Relaxed

If you look up relaxed in the dictionary, this is what you will see after this weekend:

Little Dude and Durel hung out with Nonna and PapaDu at their cool new house this weekend while I was a whirlwind of activity, volunteering at the Junior League of Austin's Christmas Affair, and hosting a pre-baby party for a dear friend.

While I was a dervish of holiday and hostess-ness, the dudes chilled out, sucked thumbs, held spoons, and watched football.

Good times were had by all.

Here's to a short week,

Heather

Learning As I Go

The playground in our neighborhood is Jack's new favorite thing.  Each time we pass it in the jogging stroller, he starts pointing and gesturing wildly, while repeating, "SLY?  SLY?"  (That means "slide.")  So, we stop and slide.  And it is awesome.  

The other option would be to tell him that we'll come back to the playground later.  That we don't have time to play right now.  That Mamma needs to check her email/make dinner/do a few things in the house.  

You know what?  That option is a big biscuit.  

Because my heart already aches with how quickly Jack is becoming a big boy.  And I know there will come a time when hanging out with Mom is the last thing he wants to do and that playground is for "babies."   And when that time comes, I do not want to regret the days that he wanted to slide and I told him I had to check my email instead.

Just sayin.'

Source: murraymitchell.com via Heather*Proper on Pinterest

Have a fabulous weekend,

Heather

Cead Mile Failte

In Irish, cead mile failte means, literally, one hundred thousand blessings.  It's a common way to say hello or welcome.  Oh, and it's pronounced like this:  SEED MEAL FAIL-chuh.

As some of you know, I lived in Galway, Ireland for my junior year of college.  I took a leave of absence from my college and attended University College Galway (now known as the National University of Ireland) as a visiting student.  I booked my own plane ticket; registered for my own classes, and found my own place to live.  For the year, I shared a flat with two Irish women and another visiting student from Spain.  Good stuff.  

The main quad at NUI Galway.
To be fair, most of my classes were in a more modern building across campus.
However, the student bar was located in this building.  That's right.
The student bar in the quad built in the 13th century.  Awesome.

While there, I fell in love with my heritage and the Irish country and people.  I took about half a semester of Gaelic (I can still count to ten in Irish) and traveled as much as possible, while taking the full Irish course load of ten classes per semester.  Yes, you read that right.  There was no slacking off on my part! (Once an overachiever...)

Downtown Galway.  Image credit

I am tremendously proud of my Irish heritage.  I look forward to teaching Jack to be proud of it, as well.  One of the joys of parenthood comes in the non-stop realizations of things you get to teach these awesome little people.  For me, today's epiphany is heritage.  And that rocks.

This Gaelic lesson has been brought to you by my Irish heritage, and my little leprechaun.

Top of the morning to ya,
Heather

Dee-Da

Back before I knew anything about having children, I was of the opinion that you could "get around" a child having a lovie.  I thought that if a child had several stuffed animals, blankets, etc., that they loved, then you could avoid the red hot panic of losing, forgetting, or misplacing One Particular Thing.  I went so far as to presume that might be good for a child.  Who needs a lovie, anyway?

Um, yeah.

I have been rewarded for this uber-rational but utterly unrealistic line of thinking with a child who has a lovie.  Just one.  And it's mandatory.  He really doesn't go from one room to another without it.  And perish the thought that he could sleep without it.  That's just crazytalk.

World, meet Dee-Da.

All images courtesy of the brilliant and talented Betsy Peticolas.

Obviously, DeeDa is a dog.  DeeDa is named after Jack's phase of babbling and labeling everything as "deedah."  Even after the words started to come, his black and white dog buddy retained the name.

To Jack, DeeDa makes everything better.  He's like Hobbes to Jack's Calvin.  Adventures are best undertaken with a truly awesome sidekick.

Hope you all have awesome sidekicks today,
Heather

Dating

Yup, he's already dating.

Jack has excellent taste in girls.  Linley dresses well, gives good hugs, and rocks the best pigtails in the competitive under two set in Austin.  

As an added bonus, neither of them seemed to mind that *both* moms accompanied them on their dinner outing.  

Hey, someone had to drive.  And refill the sippy cups.

They grow up so fast, don't they?

Heather

Wordless Wednesday

(Photo by the smart and talented Betsy Peticolas)

Take that, ovaries.
Heather

Pho

Durel and I love pho.  We could eat it every day.

[Quick side note:  Pho is a Vietnamese noodle soup.  It is magically delicious.]

Yesterday, we were feeling lazy and like eating huge bowls of soup.  So, we got pho.  As we sat around the table, lunching, we gave Jack some.

First, we gave him some noodles in his bowl.  That went pretty well, which is amazing, because he doesn't like pasta.  I stand corrected.  He *likes* rice noodles.  He has a discriminating palate.

Then, since that was going so well, I gave him some of the soup in a cup.

What is this stuff?  [Note the noodles on his face, arm, the table...]

You guys have been holding out on me!  This is GOOD!

More!  Get in my cuppy!

I'm not gonna lie.  I was kind of amazed that he liked it.  Yes, it's delicious.  And yes, he eats like crazy, and enjoys most everything.  But to see my 20 month old Little Dude slurping down beef pho like it was, well, totally delicious, blew a little bit of my mind.

What's next?  Sushi.  (Not kidding.)

Hope your weeks are filled with yummy soup,

Heather

Halloween

Durel, Jack, and I took a pass on Halloween this year.

What?  But you guys love Halloween!

We do love Halloween.  And Durel and I have outdone ourselves with costumes in the past.  But this year, things were different.

This year was the first year in several that Durel didn't have a huge work event at Halloween.

This year, Jack was under the weather for Halloween.

This year, I am crazy busy at work.

So, collectively, we decided to take a pass.

How did that make us feel?  I was probably the saddest of the bunch.  I really enjoy the Halloween party at Jack's school, and was sad that he missed the chance to parade with his buddies past all of the baby rooms (where he used to be) in his "big boy" costume.  

To symbolize both how sad I felt and how inappropriate it would have been to try and make Sicko enjoy this holiday, I provide the following:

And I had asked him to smile. 

Hope your Halloween was terrorific,

Heather

It's November First!

This means several very important things to me.

It means the red Starbucks cups are here!  (Look.  I love coffee and Christmas.  This is the two, combined.)

It means that I can start listening to Christmas music!

It means that it's time for me to start planning my Thanksgiving feast!

It also means that, like it or not, decorations will start popping up everywhere.  In Texas, it looks more like this:

than like this:

But I still love it.

Happy {my favorite month} November!
Heather