Tales of Me and the Husband - Page 118 of 207 -

March 7, 2013

lately.

{parker’s leggings: c/o doodle pants via mini social}

and psst! they’re on flash-sale there today!

the boys did some snowman building a few weeks ago. i suspect william pulled most of the weight there while parker meandered about… perhaps eating snow (steve taught him how to, thanks steve!). i bought apple cider donuts and promptly ate two of them. had to rip my right hand off a third by using my left hand. life of its own, that right hand. i read this book in about two seconds flat last week which is troubling since i have a toddler who only sleeps for about 2 hours a day. when did i read it, you ask? while he tinkered about. really, he was left to his own devices. it left me feeling a bit guilty, i’ll admit, and determined not to pick up a book so good that i can’t put it down until parker grows up a bit. nathaniel was home for a bit, which was sweet, because he and parker played most of the time and parker warmed up to him right away. oh, and what else is getting me through these last bits of cold weather until spring shows itself (which it’s going to do! promptly when the season turns!): grilled cheese and tomato soup (another thing that makes me question how much of a true ‘foodie’ i really am? i prefer american cheese. not gruyere, not cheddar, no… the grossest american cheese makes the bestest grilled cheese.). and what else? oh, daffodil plants. you pretty things you. and, unlike their shorn sister, the blooms keep comin’. get one!

March 5, 2013

The makings of a dance party.

Hound Dog by Elvis Presley on Grooveshark

The makings of a dance party are simple really. Just keep tuning into some loud, fun music, grab a few happy kids, and move your feet. We do these on the regular lately. Usually after dinner. During that sometimes witchy dinner’s-over-but-it’s-not-bedtime-yet hour. Parker loves them, especially if we all chant “Go Parker!” while he twirls in the middle of our watching eyes. And Lindsey, she’s got moves. You can catch her doing her own thing complete with these sophisticated head moves as we all dance about. There’s falling and rolling and spinning and twirling too. I’d recommend some Stevie Wonder, some Motown, or some Elvis if you want to get the party started in your own home too.

(And BTW, thank you Kaity and Rachael for both helping me with gifs!)

March 4, 2013

five things.

{baseball tee: asos}

{jeans: f21}

{ballet flat: old navy}

last week sydney tagged me in that whole five random things about me and… where to begin? what to share?? what five things among millions of totally titillating things do i even choose?!

enough. i’ll just pick five. truth be told, there aren’t thaaaaaat many. (i lied! there totally are! i’m really interesting!)

1// i can tap dance. i’m not like a star, no fred astaire here but i’m decent and maybe i’ll whip out a ‘lil home video one day if you’re lucky. maybe i can even get steve to do the splits (he can!!). a hunt talent show! i highly doubt it though because he embarrasses easily (too easily if you ask me). the only times he whips out that gem of a party trick is when he’s got a few drinks under his belt and we’re at a wedding. otherwise, it’s pretty much a no-go.

2// i almost always have music playing. spotify, pandora, my ipod. i’m not a complete silence kinda gal, sue me! and i think i’m passing on the love for music to parker (yes, yes! it’s definitely my doing! go me!) because the kid can carry a beat! he dances all the time (and these days the tune that gets him out of an incredibly concentrated puzzle-solving-stupor is big parade by lumineers). and, because i’m generous, i’m sharing my latest playlist here.

3// i’m one of four girls. some say, “your poor dad” but i say whatever to that ish. (and he loved having all daughters, for serious.) we were not girly girls by any means. we did sports and all that jazz so he got his fill of, you know, whatever men need to get their fill of. i’d say, though, that i was the daughter with whom he got to watch all the normal movies guys like to watch. that is a long and confusing title but, basically, a shoot-em-up movie? i was his gal. we watched the first godfather together, last of the mohicans, platoon, and everything in between. i still love those movies cause they remind me of him, i guess. pass the popcorn!

4// i loved high school. i’m learning more and more that this is highly unusual. most of you hated high school? is it true? i had great friends, guys and girls, and generally we were all really nice to each other. am i remembering this right, guys? also, i am coming up on my ten-year reunion this thanksgiving which is THE CRAZIEST.

5// i grew up in a pretty affluent town. we had a nice home but were not terribly rich ourselves. while a lot of my friends were driving pretty sweet cars, i had this (technically that’s an ’82 but plymouth wasn’t making any leaps and bounds in body style two years later.). a 1984 plymouth horizon. (mind you, i too was born in ’84. really, we were meant to be.) it was a matte gray which, i’m not sure, was its original color but rather what it became over time. it was given to us for free. my sister and i shared it. if it rained too hard, the floor of the passenger seat flooded so my dad drilled a hole in it to drain. you could hear it coming from blocks away. my dad was a fireman in our town and, for fire prevention night, the car finally met its demise when we volunteered it as the demo car for the ‘jaws of life’. you jealous?

and i nearly forgot! i’m supposed to tag youuuuu now.

okay, here goes: grace, kate, megan, elizabeth, and rachael.

(i feel like i should both apologize for tagging you and demand that you DO IT.)

March 1, 2013

breakfast date.

{top: c/o tailor and stylist}

{scarf: c/o chapter one and co.}

the three of us had the best day today. we headed to one of our favorite towns for breakfast (real purpose was to get the sewing machine serviced so lindsey and i can start using it!). and… old habits die hard… we didn’t spice up our routine with a new place (one day, one day!) but kept with our old standard: friendly toast. now, let me take a moment to talk about my breakfast. it deserves it (deserves its own post, i tell you what). it’s approximately seven hours later and i am still thinking about it. do you have those meals that you keep thinking about hours and days later? that’s how you know it’s good. (unfortunately, this was a special. THAT THEY SHOULD ADD TO THE MENU IMMEDIATELY.) okay, just listen. listen to this. it was three crispy tortillas. stacked. in between were the following layers of magic: black beans, jack cheese, and fresh tomatoes on one, corn salsa and jack cheese in the middle, and then on the top were creamy scrambled eggs, sour cream, and cilantro. hot damn, it was amazing. explosion in my mouth.

moving on. there is some major sand-moving-crane-bulldozer-truck-freighter action (you like that description?) going on down by the water and parker was enthralled. i mean enthralled. i might’ve even gotten teary eyed when a trucker smiled and honked just for him. who knew i’d find such pleasure in both learning the names of such machines and seeing him enjoy them so much. i’m a sap and it’s the best.

dude, portsmouth is really a fabulous town. this isn’t new, but i fall in love with it a little more any time i visit. steve and i even toyed with the idea of moving there. i so would. and the drive on 1a that takes you along the water is incredible too. it’s east coast’s version of the pch. bear with me. maybe a little less cool but we have more history so take that california!!

February 27, 2013

sakura bloom sling diaries: beauty

Child by Edward Sharpe & The Magnetic Zeros on Grooveshark

this is the end of the sling diaries for me and my littlest man. it has been so nice… documenting his last several weeks through this series. i’m always snapping pictures of him, but with me in them? that is a more rare occasion so these entries are special to me. thank you for the gorgeous slings, sakura bloom… but thank you too for forcing me to get these pictures with me and the rapidly-changing parker. i love them. (and thank you steve for taking these pictures along the way!)

now, beauty. doing the sling diaries through the winter months in massachusetts was not always easy. there was no fun sunshinin’, frolickin’ in the beach waves opportunities. for me, anyway. (bron has been doing the sling diaries this round as well–in australia! so… different story. sometimes i was a little envious of their temperatures + bare skin!)

here in massachusetts, the winters can be downright dreary. but after experiencing several of them now, i consider myself a full fledged new englander (complete with sorels and a down jacket and, you know, the various winter accoutrements that fill in the gaps) and with that comes an appreciation for this season, for each season. for some perhaps it’s especially a hatred for this season, but really. i mean it when i say that i have come to appreciate it, accept it, and, often, embrace it. maybe i’m forcing myself to because, fighting it… what’s the point? but take a few days ago for instance. we were first supposed to get a foot of snow, and then as the time neared the reports tapered down to a few inches or so. we always get the essentials, just in case… some milk, eggs, butter. but, with a snowblower at the ready, we’re not usually trapped for too long. anyway, the snow came at night and continued through the night so it wasn’t until the morning that i really saw the scope of our latest fall. it was gorgeous. and i don’t mean gorgeous in a way that you just have to say to make it seem as though you are appreciating it. i mean, it was stunning. it nearly took your breath away. it was a heavy, wet snow so it sat on the branches longer than its fluffier sister (you know, the light and airy snowy sister). add to that, the sun was shining so brightly and, well, it was a masterpiece right outside my front window. and no matter how hard you try you can never get a good picture of that. it just never works. so you have to remember it with a bit of awe and sadness knowing that it won’t last very long–the snow on the branches never does, blame it on the wind or sun or its very own weightiness–and that you really can’t capture it accurately. but, beautiful it is. in the dead of winter, the beauty is there. you don’t only find it in the fresh snow, but it’s other places too. in a long stretch of icy, crackly, snow-patchy marsh. or the red birds (cardinals, are they?) that find their place amongst the frozen branches outside our window. or a snowman built by snow-eager kids. or in parker’s face, always in parker’s face, as he discovers it all. each and every season. even you, winter.

i wear parker in the pure baby sling in organic maple.

thank you so much for following along with us on this sling diaries journey.

here are all the posts we’ve done since the beginning.

please visit the sling diaries pinterest page to see everyone’s entries!

and! they’re looking for participants for their next round.

go here to find out how to enter.

{i would highly suggest it. leigh + lynne from sakura bloom are incredibly sweet and generous women who were a pleasure to work with. not to mention, baby-wearing is about the greatest thing ever!}

February 25, 2013

super parker: a hunt productions movie trailer

the kids had all of last week off from school. massachusetts’ public school thing. it’s kind of torture, every single year, because the weather isn’t really nice, and steve never has off this break (can’t college and public school get on the same schedule?!), so we end up doing little things here and there, but mostly trying not to spend a ton of money, and to still be home for dinner when steve gets home. and now, with parker and one wonkin’ midday nap (respect the nap!!), well, enough with my saga… needless to say, we needed some diversions.

i have so few apps, outside of some photo ones, on my iphone. so, when lindsey came home from a friend’s house telling me about the imovie app they were playing with, i was interested. it sounded seriously fun so i checked it out and, indeed it was. they spent, all told, probably a good four to five hours using this app throughout the week and they made some hilarious movie trailers. they took turns as director, and (shocker!) hardly fought at all. i’m chalking it up to the imovie magic! parker even got to star in some of them. they would run downstairs to show me different scenes and we would laugh and laugh. it is such a fun app. i recommend downloading it immediately.

there’ll probably be more of these trailers to come on the blog. they’re still loving this app. but back to school they go, so their stint as director and writer and producer will have to be on hold a bit.

(they totally asked, “will it be on the blog?!” william’s psyched that the one he directed made the final cut. it is pretty darn funny, to us anyway, though they might’ve lost a little steam towards the end. trying to direct an 19-month old proved challenging i think.)

February 20, 2013

Make-up and mustaches.

Yep. That’s about right.

Lindsey asks at least once a week when she can wear make-up. I tell her, every time, that she can start wearing (some, a little) make-up when she’s in 7th or 8th grade. Or did I say fifteen? I guess she’s trying to find a weak spot in my argument. Which can’t be that difficult to do since I can’t remember exactly what I told her. When it feels right, Lindsey! For her, that time is now. The last time she asked I said I’d add a year if she kept asking. That was yesterday. She hasn’t asked in 24 hours. She did, however, come home from a sleepover with mascara on. She and her little friend probably swiped the Mom’s mascara in the wee hours of the morning to get themselves all Honey-Boo-Boo’d up. I noticed as soon as she came home and she was all, “HOW DID YOU KNOW?” It’s good to let them know every once in awhile: Mom knows allllllllllll.

William. William’s sprouting dark hairs along his upper lip. Steve and I have this conversation, weekly at this point, shave or bleach? It’s not such a conversation, really. Steve could care less. Me, however, I’m in the bleach-camp. If he starts to shave, he’ll have to keep shaving! Bleaching is the answer, it’s not growing fast! Steve says no one bleaches their son’s upper lip hair. How does he know? Can you see men, shooting the breeze in the lunch line asking, “Hey Bob, so uh, you bleach Jay’s upper lip hair yet? Nah? Shave? Ok.” NO. And furthermore who says it’s wrong just because, as he claims, no one does that. So far, we’ve done nothing, but I routinely want to take a magic eraser to his upper lip. They work on nearly everything, why haven’t I considered this as a viable third option? Either way, it’s remaining at this point. Just this dirty little upper lip that I have a hard time not focusing on when we talk.

And attitude. We’ve got attitude. The other night we had a movie night. Steve had brought blankets and extra pillows in and everything and made the room all cozy for movie night. Once the movie ended, he asked that they grab a blanket, a pillow, whatever, and put it back where it went on their way out. Lindsey exclaims, “EVERY TIME I HAVE TO DO SOMETHING WHEN I’M REALLY TIRED IT TAKES ME FOREVER TO FALL ASLEEP.” It was emphatic, dramatic… lunATic (I’m really trying to make lunatic rhyme with the other two.). It was hilarious. And William. He acts all aloof if he’s being disciplined sometimes. Which makes you want to scream, you know? Oh, he DOESN’T CARE DOES HE? Well then let’s take this crazy train UP A FEW NOTCHES.

Body odor and hair growth and makeup-requests and drama aside, they are really funny and cool and still, praise be, think we’re pretty funny and cool too. They still want to hang out with us and go places with us and I know those days are numbered. You know, we’ve seen the other side. The side where they turn into a crazy-person-grump also known as teeeeeeenager. NOT NAMING ANY NAMES. But, we pray and hope and wish that they will come out on the other side… alive, mostly unscathed, and hopefully, most of all, still loving us.

It’s a journey, ain’t it?

(And, I feel like my days of being able to write about William and Lindsey on this blog are dwindling fast. You know, besides the boring stuff. So, I need to get it all out while I can. Make-up and mustaches lead the charge!)

February 18, 2013

lindsey’s room.

i’m not a “house tour” kinda gal in part because a) my house isn’t amazing (i love my house, but it isn’t house tour amazing, i mean.) and b) i don’t know… privacy maybe? something weird about putting my house on my blog and showing you “here is the window placement should you want to break in.” i know i’m a little overboard with that. but, it is what it is. i gots to sleep at night. and i get sweaty palms if i feel like too much of my life is out there in the internet abyss so having a blog in and of itself is, at times, already a bit ‘out there’ for me.

now, lindsey’s room. i’m branching out of my fear of showing you where our windows are because her room is really lovely and it’s reeeeally high off the ground so chances are we’d see or hear you before you got all four limbs inside the house.

i am a notoriously sloooow decorator (and a cheap one too) so, we didn’t get here overnight. but rome was not built in a day, my friends! i wish we had a before picture because it was just blahhhhh. wallpaper border, greenish blah walls. in time, it came to be what it was and she loves it. so do we. and props to my main man steve for doing any painting and heavy lifting. and for installing branches from our own backyard as the curtain rods. now THAT is thrifty.

(not shown: closet to the left just past the bookshelf that steve built shelves in and all, and another bureau/vanity to the right along the wall you can’t see.)