Daddy's surgery

John had surgery on Friday for a deviated septum. I never knew how funny someone could be after having general anesthesia! He was saying all kinds of funny stuff and at one point thought their were bees in his bedroom. It took John FOUR HOURS to wake up enough to go home and even after that he was a mess. Poor thing, I even got his sleepy drunk self on video--thank goodness for camera phones.

He basically spent the entire weekend in bed sleeping or resting. We did manage to get out on Saturday to Tysons to return some expensive jeans I bought last weekend (impulse buy). On Sunday we managed to get out for some breakfast but he spent the rest of the day resting. My in laws did come over for dinner though, which was nice.

So now it's Monday and the man is still feeling crappy. Too bad he would kill me if I posted the funny videos, so if you want to see them, you will have to come see me!

FOLEY BABY IS HERE!

Clare and Josh are parents! Daniel Padreig Foley was born via C-section in the wee hours of the morning today! He weighed in at 7 lbs and 3 oz. Mommy and baby are doing great!

We were hoping for a St. Patrick's day baby, but we are blessed with a beautiful bouncing boy!

Happy Birthday to Mommy

My birthday was Friday and it was a fabulous weekend! We met up with John for breakfast and then I went to my mom's to work while she played with AJ. We had a fabulous lunch at Mike's and my best friend Lauren and McKenna came to join us. After work, John and I went into DC to check in to our hotel, the Omni Shoreham. We enjoyed a great dinner at Coco Sala and then went to see a Shear Madness at the Kennedy Center. Afterwards we went into Georgetown for some drinks, which was very shortlived. When I got back to the hotel room, this was waiting for me:

As you can tell, I couldn't wait!

Saturday was a FABULOUS day weatherwise. After getting to sleep in a bit and breakfast in the room, we went to Georgetown for a day of shopping. Afterwards we stopped by Broiler and picked up dinner for the entire family before heading to my parents to celebrate both my birthday and my sister in law's birthday (hers was on the 8th). What a great birthday!

Birthday Week

I was raised where we didn't just celebrate a birth 'day', but a birth 'week'! My parents were really great at making it a party after party after party (and who would have thought I would have been a party planner in my adult years?!). It always made us feel so special. As a child, I had THE BEST birthday parties. I must say that I was pretty popular in elementary school (when it was still cool to be smart :)). I think it was my mom's awesome party planning skills that made me just so cool. Ok, so I thought I was cool, but I was really in reality a nerd that had a mom that threw great parties so all of the kids wanted to go. I mean what 5th grader would pass up the opportunity to dress up in 70's clothes and play 70's related games?! True story, I had a 70's theme party and surprisingly all of the kids had fun! Even the guys that went on to become star athletes in high school dressed up--oh, why didn't I pull those out in high school? I could have made a pretty penny!

Anyway, back to the post. It's my birthday week--my birthday is on Friday (in case you want to send me a present :))--and I think it officially was kicked off yesterday. My parents and in laws came over to visit with AJ. My awesome in laws brought me a bouquet of beautiful colorful flowers and two fantastic gift cards (I think a shopping day is in order). We had a great visit with them all--and AJ was up until 9:30 making them laugh. He is such a good boy.

Today I got a present in the mail from my Aunt Barb--all Chelsea Handler gifts! She knows me well, and knows that my favorite female comedian is Chelsea Handler. I DVR her show--Chelsea Lately--and have read both of her books. John for my birthday last year got us tickets to her tour here in DC--second row tickets! So needless to say, this was a very thoughtful gift. She got me her new book--Chelsea, Chelsea Bang Bang--two t-shirts (can't repeat on there, since this is a family friendly blog--and a Chelsea Coffee mug (again, can't say what it says).

On top of all this, my son is giving me the best present EVER--singing Happy Birthday to me! He has had some practice recently with my mom, my sister, Roman, my dad, and stepmom's birthday all within the last two months. It's so precious--I'll have to get it on tape.

On Friday my mom took the day off and we will go to lunch. That evening John has a whole night planned (he is such a great husband!). Looking forward to it!

So far, a great start to my birthday 'week'. Here is to celebrating even when you are old! I believe you should ALWAYS celebrate your birthday, even if the number makes you depressed!

Jamaica Part I

It's time to start blogging about our fabulous Jamaica trip! Our trip started out at 5am--we were being picked up at 6am. We got the opportunity to fly first class non stop to Montego Bay. Although it was still hard to fly with a toddler, I must say it was awesome in first class! We had a really good breakfast on the plane and got to enjoy a couple drinks for free! 3.5 hours later we landed and went through the terrible customs and immigration that Jamaica has to offer. By now AJ was ready for a nap and I don't blame him.

From Montego Bay to Negril we had the option of taking a 1.5-2 hour shuttle or paying some more money and taking a 15 minute flight. We chose the flight. We were SO glad! The pilot picked AJ up on the way to the small plane:

John was co-pilot. He even got to fly the plane!!!!

Scary! Here is a beautiful view:

We landed and were taken to our resort, about 3 minutes away. We arrived and went to conceiarge to check in. We stayed at the Beaches chain because we had a good experience last year in Turks and Caicos. Anyway, of course, we got there so early that our room wasn't ready! We went to each lunch--while at lunch, Cookie Monster was walking around! AJ and I ran over to him!

By the time we got back our room was ready. We quickly changed and went on the beach--but we decided to go for a walk. AJ LOVED THE WATER! It took a long time to get the kid to go 1/100th of a mile! Finally he wanted to be held and John volunteered to hold him while we walked--AJ soon fell asleep on his shoulder. We mainly just people watched with our feet skimming the water. Before we knew it, it was dinner time! We made it back to the resort and had dinner at the buffet. Afterwards we were so exhausted that we just went back to the room and crashed. I think we were out by 8pm!

The next day (Sunday) we woke up refreshed and ready to go. After breakfast we went straight to the beach. It was a perfect day. AJ loved the water and one of his favorite activities was to throw the sand into the ocean. Almost like he was telling the sand to go away!

I went on this huge water bicycle (you can see them in the picture behind AJ) while AJ and Daddy hung out in the water. Afterwards, John went jetskiing. He ran over to where AJ and I were and told us he had it for an hour and wanted us to come on with him. I guess in Jamaica they let babies jet ski. We went slow and stayed close to shore with AJ. The jet ski guy even had a toddler life jacket in his jet ski compartment! AJ loved it, but after 5 minutes, he fell asleep! Who falls asleep while you are jetskiing! After that we laid out on our lounges while AJ slept on my chest.

Afterwards we went on the lazy river. Sadly, we all enjoyed this too much that we didn't get any pictures! Before we knew it Sunday was over and we were yet again in bed by 9pm. This was the night that AJ climbed out of his crib--and so it began a week full of him sleeping with us!

Monday was another relaxing day spent at the beach and pool. That evening, we had dinner: my boy and I, just to prove I was actual there since I take the pictures:

After dinner they had a Sesame Street Stage Show. Beaches is a sponsor of Sesame Street. AJ loved the characters!

Look at how he is concentrating!

AJ got to touch Elmo and get a big hug--this made his night!

There is so much more to tell you about, but I will have to wait!

Spring is in the Air! Hopefully to stay!

It has been so beautiful this week! It's been in the 60's and sunny all week! The three of us have gone on 4 mile walk/run's twice this week and been to the park two other evenings. We hope to walk again tonight. I work from home and have most of the windows in this house open to let some fresh air in--it's so nice!. This has been the winter from H E double Hockey Sticks, so this weather has been craved by me for quite some time.

On another note, I lost our battery to my Nikon camera last weekend. I put it in to charge, I thought, but then when I went to the charging station it wasn't there. I have been known to be absentminded, so I thought I put it down somewhere. After looking EVERYWHERE (or so I thought), I asked AJ to find my battery and he walked over to his tricycle, opened up the seat compartment and pulled it out. Just like that! The kid is so funny. Now I know where his new hiding place is. So that means I can charge it and then upload our vacation pictures and start blogging about our fabulous vacation!

Sesame Street

We know what the theme of AJ's second birthday will be--SESAME STREET!

While in Jamaica, AJ spent a LOT of time with Elmo, Bert and Ernie, Cookie Monster, Zoe, Count, and Abbie and I will tell you he LOVED them. I won't give away my plans for his party (we all know how I love to plan!), but I have some tricks up my sleeve for this years party. Now I just have to decide where I'm going to have the party and we are good to go!

Back to the grind

I haven't had a moment to get the pictures on my computer yet! It's been so overwhelming coming back--and depressing. It's cold and rainy here and I keep thinking about the sun and warmth of Jamaica! It makes me very unmotivated to unpack, go grocery shopping, clean my house, cook any kind of meal, do laundry, and work. I started to get my life back in order today, but I have a ways to go!

The switch to the toddler bed isn't going so well--but it's to be expected I guess. The first night he yelled "MOMMA" and "DADDA" so I went in there twice, 10 minutes apart, which made it worse. He yelled like this--at his door--for about an hour before falling asleep in front of the door on the floor. I couldn't even open the door to get him in his bed. Letting him yell like that killed me, but it had to be done, I know AJ and if I continued to go in there he would have been up all night long. He slept through the night and even slept in until almost 9am--and woke up in a REALLY good mood.

Last night he did the same thing, but it only lasted about 15 minutes before he fell asleep on the floor again in front of his door.

John is putting him to bed now and I'm in the basement so I can't hear him call for me. It breaks my heart! I'll update on tonight's progress!

I hear the two hardest things to do with toddlers are to switch them to a toddler bed and potty train. We don't' plan on potty training for quite a while (AJ has started to potty train himself, but he has a while to go before he is truly potty trained), so we just have to get through this!

But then after they are potty trained and sleeping in a big kid bed, there is a whole other stage of obstacles to overcome--and they keep coming and coming!


UPDATE!!! I am VERY happy to report that AJ fell asleep IN HIS BED without any fussing! My little boy is now a BIG BOY!