Is Your Child a Biter?

All this talk of vampires...and Emmett gets bit. A giant chomp on his cheek yesterday morning from vampire baby. Actually there were 2 bites. The first occurred so quick, while our little vampires mom was around, I wasn't sure it was a bite. Emmett just started wailing and his calf was all red. Baby vampires mom pulled him away and scolded him to be gentle. I didn't think much about it. But 2 hours later (it was vampire moms b-day and I was watching her kids for her)Emmett was in his saucer (I thought he was safe), and chomp. This time it was really bad. Who could blame baby vampire. Emmett has lusciously chubby cheeks. I often want to eat him up too. But this was quite traumatizing.

(This picture is of the wound after a day, it looked a lot worse yesterday)

Don't misunderstand, I love vampire baby. He is darling and sweet and only 11 months old. His mom is awesome. A wonderful mom and friend. I love her too. So what do you do when your child is a biter? This is one of those dilemmas I constantly face as a parent. I tell my kids to speak in a kind voice, but sometimes after telling them kindly 6x my tone can become not so kind anymore. Sigh....what to do?

Whether in business or as a mom I have to make choices everyday. With each decision I hope it's the right one. I have to keep on my knees a lot. I need lots of help to maneuver my way through life. Sometimes the clutter, the laundry, the endless bedtime battles, the uncertainty in trying to raise kind, confident, well adjusted children, the ups and downs...it can all be a bit daunting. It takes faith, that's for sure.

I'm Not in Love with Edward. Anyone Else?

I have held off reading the Twilight series for sometime. They just haven't seemed that appealing to me. But on Friday I read an opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal about Stephanie Meyer and the Twilight phenomenon. The jist of the piece was the positive, and meaningful effect Meyers is having on teen sexuality. Government and schools and parents for that matter have been trying unsuccessfully for years to promote abstinence, with no success. But Stephanie Meyers has made abstinence HOT!

I was intrigued. I have always been a firm believer in abstinence before marriage. My husband was as well. I was drawn to the bookstore to support a mother who was helping young women everywhere expect more from relationships. I bought the paperback versions of Twilight and New Moon.

Disappointed. That sums up my review of this book. I could not get into the romance. Maybe if I was in High School, but even then... My husband says I didn't get into it because I have the real thing. A perfect husband, a deep emotionally, spiritually and physically satisfying relationship. He's right. I don't know if that is why the book didn't work for me or not. I'm sure there are women out there with satisfying relationships who liked these books.

I am giving New Moon to my nineteen year old sister for her birthday next week. She is definitely still yearning for an Edward to love and love her.

It is a fascinating study in a vastly popular trend. I have read quite a bit about the development of this "movement." We need a cap trapper movement. Maybe I should put a picture of Edward on my packaging. Then I would really attract some women!

Maybe if I get bored I will finish the series. I read The Host. I actually preferred it. It was far fetched but I admit being quite drawn into the plot. Less romantic. I hope I haven't offended the millions of Twilight Lovers out there!

5 Minutes for Mom

Check out the review and contest giveaway over at 5 minutes for Mom. They are a great blog site. Leave a comment to enter the contest if you want.

Back to School Shopping

I had my first back-to-school shopping adventure as a mom on Friday. I have so many great memories of shopping with my mom for school. I also will fess up to wearing thick wool sweaters and jeans to school when it was 90 degrees outside because I was so excited to wear my new clothes. Ellery and I headed to the mall. I tried to monitor and avoid the ultra sparkly, teeney bopper clothes that are the rage for the little elementary schoolers. I don't want her to look 14. My goodness she is only 5! I think we only ended up with a glittered hot pink belt, thankfully no Hannah Montana backpacks. I'm glad she is still drawn to Minnie Mouse.


The two of us then headed to Einsteins for some bagels. At one point I caught her gazing off into her own world. I asked her what she was thinking about. Her answer: her new minnie backpack. She is so precious. I hope kindergarten is everything she has built it up in their mind to be.

13.1 Miles

I completed my first 1/2 marathon on Saturday. I have to say I felt great. No knee pain. No hip pain. It was smooth sailing. I tuckered out a bit the last 2 miles because we had to wind around (it was a straight shot out of the canyon before that), but overall I feel great. I ended up with an official time of 1:35.40. That put my race pace at 7:19 min/miles. I have to do 8:23 min/miles to qualify for Boston, so it seems within my grasp. I am trying not to get my hopes up.

It was so fun to run through the shoot and have my little girls and husband calling my name. They always look a bit concerned about me though. (I think I appear to be in quite a bit of pain. Which I usually am for that push at the end.) Of course what they were really excited about was waiting for me so I could get them pancakes and fruit. Oh well. Brent forgot the camera, but he did manage all 3 kids.

One step closer to 26.1 miles!

Women are the Best

Something I have found while trying to navigate the formation of a viable company Savvy May Creations, is how much I appreciate the help and tips of others. And I think in the network of women/mom owned businesses everyone is especially willing to help each other out. I have gotten some great tips.

My friend Amy over at Super Healthy Kids tipped me off to this email list called Help a Reporter Out. She subscribes and saw a question she thought I should answer. I did. It was about moms who invent. I emailed a response of course all about Cap Trappers . Today I was interviewed by First Magazine. Who knows if it will end up making the cut (with my luck probably not) but what a great tip! Much thanks to Amy. And if you haven't bought one of her plates yet, please do. I have 3. My kids and I both love them. She is also a woman after my own heart with her quest to keep her family eating healthy.

I get emails from this PR firm called ChicExecs PR. I usually delete them because I have zero money to pay for PR, but they gave some free tips out. One was for a celebrity baby shower for Alison Sweeney (host of Biggest Loser) put on by Hot Moms Club. They were looking for items for the guest bags. The bags are given to those in attendance as well as 4 for the press. They said Pregnancy and OK Magazines will be covering the bags. So I emailed. It turns out they are interested in putting Cap Trappers in. Again it is all in the works. If I have learned anything about business...don't count your chickens before they are hatched. But a big thanks to ChicExecs PR. If and when I can afford PR, they will definitely be at the top of my list.

Then of course Startup Princess. I always love their posts and mission to help women. The Mother of Invention contest, of course being a huge tip. They also recently blogged on celebrity gifting. It gave me the needed push to swallow my pride and I dig up those addresses my husband found for Kelly Ripa and Elisabeth Hasselbeck. I sent them off some packages filled with Cap Trappers for their kids. I fully fessed up to my shameless plot for publicity. But even if they don't talk about them, maybe they will just enjoy them. If my husbands sluething is correct and they receive them that is! I have no reasons to doubt his expertise :)

My husband introduced me to a great girl over at Northridge Media. She is a fellow triathlete, so we clicked. She just did the spudman too! She offered me a free quarter page add in Scrapbook Trends and Paper Trends. Awesome publicity. When I can afford to pay for ads you bet I will! But this will be a great trial to see if the ads bring any traffic and sales.

All of these tips were from women. Way to go women. I try to pass along my tips as well. So hopefully what goes around comes around and all of us find a bit more success.

Read This to Feel Better About Yourself

This post is to make sure everyone knows I am not a "supermom." So let's just keep things real.

Summer Home School. Down the Drain.

Remember that whole summer schedule...well I was dreaming. The girls loved it for about 3 weeks. Then vacation after vacation interfered. All of a sudden every time I try to start our school time, I am greeted with a chorus of "Noooo, it's not fun Mom." So then I have to admit I stoop to comments like, "Ellery you must not want to go to Kindergarten next year." I really have some work to do with my parenting skills. Most days end up like yesterday. Our structured learning time lasted about 10 minutes...and the wild roaming of the neighborhood...5 hours.

Emmett was Smelling Awfully Sweet

I looked down at my sweet son yesterday and realized I couldn't remember the last time I had bathed him. I know. Horrible. I would have probably thought a mother like myself needed to be turned into family services, before I had three children of my own. His vitals were clean, but everything else was getting quite ripe. I bathed him last night so you can hang up the phone.


The Ugliest Bread Loaf You Have Ever Seen

I think I need some sort of prize for the ugliest bread loaf ever created. I have been honing my bread making skills for four years now. I was beginning to feel like something of an expert. In fact I am even mildly well known amongst my friends and neighbors for my bread. So a couple weeks ago I decided I would do a post on bread making. I took pictures from the unground grains all the way through the process. Then something odd happened. My loaves raised funny and they turned into the ugliest things I'd ever made. So I scratched the post to wait and take pictures of the next time I made bread. That happened today. You guessed it. Again. The ugliest loaves. I have no idea what happened. I didn't change anything. Any true experts out there know what my problem is? They do taste great still (to my own defense), but they look horrid. I was getting to confident.


So much for the TV Diet

Remember that big national TV appearance I had...that ended up getting canned...well I lost 10 lbs in anticipation. I put 5 lbs back on. Remember this is at the same time I am exercising like a maniac. I ran 13 miles on Monday. How do you put on weight doing that? Okay, I know. I get super hungry and so I eat a lot. Healthy stuff, but obviously too many calories.

Green Thumb Turned Something Else

My garden is a mess. My tomatoes, beans, peas, melons, everything is either wildly out of control or a dud. My jalepenos are sweet. No kick. My lettuce tastes so gross Brent and I finally admitted to each other we didn't even want to eat it anymore. I did have some kale that I tried so hard to grow last year...it wouldn't come up...that surfaced this year. It tastes good. I am still holding out some hope, but not much. I can't blame it on the weather. My neighbors garden looks like her cucumbers and tomatoes were grown in the Garden of Eden.


There you have it. Just keeping things real. Go feel a whole lot better about yourself.

"The Traveling Rules"

We taught our children some very specific rules for travel. They could recite them perfectly. Following them.....a whole different story.

BTW...when did they start charging $3 for carts? Luckily this one we found abandoned. It provided at least a 20 minute diversion during the layover yesterday.

Discovery Kingdom USA

We had a much more successful day at Six Flags than in the city. We equipped ourselves with tons of food and rented a big double stroller for the girls. I was impressed with the park. There was so much to do for little children. And while it was a far cry from DisneyLand, it was clean and entertaining. My only complaint...the prices. It was super expensive to get in, and then they nickle and dimed you for EVERYTHING once you were in the park.

Before the Log Ride....notice Ellery clutching Brent!


After the Log Ride...not too wet!

Emmett, smiling and kicking the day away. He hung out with Papi in the shade.


These smiles were actually real and continued almost "perma-smiles" the entire day.


Thomas the Train. When Emmett gets a little older, I'm sure the whole family will appreciate this ride more. Ellery and Callista only have a vague idea of who Thomas is. But assured me that Emmett "loves" Thomas.


Mimi's favorite: The Butterfly Gardens. Actually the girls and I loved this too. Butterflies were everywhere. It was almost more than Ellery could handle. She kept grabbing my arm and tugging me this way and that to snap photos.

Another Great Review of Cap Trappers

Check out the review and contest at Boutique Cafe.

San Francisco a view from the Tahoe

I have come to understand the word "vacation" in a whole new light with 3 children. Previous trips to California found us jaunting around to beaches, restaurants, shops, hikes etc. Now it consists of what can we see out the window of my father-in-laws tahoe. This included:

A whiz through China Town (I think I saw some knock-off Prada...not sure...it's hard to tell when you are going 35 mph)

A drive down Lombard Street (My mom grew up in SF, she always believed her dad held some sort record for speeding down the "curviest street in the world." I don't think they let you do that anymore. Pops wasn't up for trying.)




A run out to the beach to snap a photo; we really should have kept the car running. It was freezing. (The smile on Ellery's face, I am pretty sure that was the only one of the day. I think we also must have bribed or threatened her somehow, I have blocked it out.)



A pic at the Golden Gate Bridge. (This time we did keep the car running and Peter Pan playing.)



A stop at Fisherman's Wharf. Ellery agreed to get out because she knew there was a chocolate shop where Papi would buy her something.


A quick tour of Alcatraz. (Okay...so I glanced at it from the raised walkway on the way to the wharf. )

To my children's defense, they were extremely tired. Everything is hard when you are tired. For every season of life there are frustrations and joy. Yesterday...during an especially blissful moment of our layover in Long Beach... Brent told me he was going to put me on the plane with the kids and just disappear. I love him. I love our children. What an adventure is life!

And a tragic side note which added a huge kink into the vacation. We have lost our beloved Premaxx sling. I know Emmett was getting big for it...but ohhhh I missed it. We believe it must be in a potato field in Idaho...it never made it home from the spudman. Such is life.

Back in the Home State

At 11:30 pm last night, I wasn't sure if we would ever make it home. I don't know if I will ever fly jetblue again. Too bad. When we flew last year we had such a good experience. California was great. The children are exhausted. Parents are exhausted. Will post some pics soon.