I Fuffoo

That's Liam's "I love you."

Liam is doing a great job showing love and affection for his little brother. This morning, I've only been awake for about an hour and already he's melted my heart again. Colin was fussing while I had Liam on my lap (we were watching Toy Story 3) so I had to put him down and pick up the bairn. Then I asked Liam if he still wanted on my lap and he replied he did. There I was, sitting with both my lads on my lap, and I took Liam's hand and had him hold Colin's hand (it was the part of Toy Story 3 where the toys are just about to be incinerated and they all hold hands - that part makes me tear up every single time I see it!). Anyway, Colin immediately grabs Liam's finger and just about bending his hand backwards. Liam turns to Colin and says, "I so much Cow'n. I SO much Cow'n." There was so much gentleness and genuine affection in that voice. So what that he missed the Fuffoo part. The fact is he said he loved Colin so much, to Colin, without prompting from me or Jon. Oh my, I'm getting teary just writing this. Can't believe my sweet little guy, my Smoochie, is gonna be 3 in two more days!!!

throw together meatloaf

What's for dinner? I've been wanting to make a meatloaf since last week. It's a little hard to want to make one though when the weather outside is so dang hot. I probably should have done it on Sunday when I already had the oven on for bread baking, but oh well, it didn't happen then. I don't have any exact measurements for this, but I'll give you the basics.

What you need for meatloaf, any meatloaf, is ground meat, a filler, a binder, and seasoning.

The meat: today, just 1 pound of 85/15 ground beef. I actually estimated the weight because our kitchen scale needs a new battery and a majority of the beef was still frozen although I had had it out on the counter to thaw all day; it was a 3 pound package that we hadn't separated before putting in the freezer.

The fillers: I started off making lardons (basically bits) from 3 slices of bacon. While they were frying, I julienned (you must get yourself a mandolin or v-slicer with one of these inserts) ½ a white onion, three stalks of celery, and 2 small carrots – the mirepoix. To boost the vegetable level, I also added about a ¼ up of broccoli slaw from the pack Jon bought for stir-fry the other night and a big handful of baby spinach leaves, diced. I cooked all that to soft in the bacon grease. We also needed breadcrumbs, but don't have enough bread, so I used the food processor to pulverize about a cup of butter & garlic flavored croutons.

Seasoning: The most basic seasoning is salt and don't you dare try to make any meat dish without it. Salt is the ingredient that makes meat taste meaty! I did not add any extra salt to the meat because I figured the croutons and the bacon grease were salty enough. Then I also added black pepper, a small amount of smoked paprika, and an even smaller amount of cumin (which I'm really not fond of). Oh, I also added some parsley flakes and some ketchup and yellow mustard.

The binder: one egg.

Mix it all together (by hand of course). Now here's the best tip. . . never cook your meatloaf in a loaf pan!!! The fat from the beef has nowhere to go and so the loaf essentially poaches in fat and you can't get a decent crust - possibly the bestest part of a meat loaf. Think about it. Do you really want to eat fat-poached ground meat? So I lined my loaf pan (I'd love another one for my birthday btw, hint hint) with foil and then packed the meat loaf into that. Then I lined a cookie sheet with foil and got the wire rack from our old toaster over out. (It also doubles as a great cooling rack when you're making just a couple of freezer cookies at a time.) Turned the loaf out onto the rack, peeled the foil away, and set in the oven at 325F; cook the thing until internally it reaches 160F and you won't get sick.

Sadly, we don't have any mashed 'taters to serve with the meatloaf. Oh well.

Colin is 4 (months)

The little Coco-butter is now 4 months old and becoming a better human every day. I'm getting a little apprehensive because I can't believe it's almost Back to School time and I'll be leaving my little guy and heading back to work in a couple weeks. Here's the latest on Colin Alexander Rogers: Age 4m.

Likes:

• sleeping in Mommy and Daddy's bed (no we don't co-sleep, but he falls asleep nice and hard after his early morning meal and can sleep a couple hours more if we leave him on the bed)
• his JumperRoo (which he is now a pro at using and gets everyone in the house smiling when he uses it)
• his feet - he hasn't quite gotten them into his mouth yet, but he loves to hold them and usually only talks when he's got his feet in his hands
• LIAM!!! - zOMG his big brother is probably the most awesome thing Colin has ever encountered
• diaper changes - probably the time Daddy and I get the biggest smiles from him is when he's trying to make diaper changing difficult by grabbing feet, diapers, or various articles of clothing
• Lamaze toys - he was obsessing over Mortimer "Bruce" Moose earlier in the month but switched to Jacques Peacock. Then we got him a "knot monster" the other day when we wanted to go to Roseville and he love love loves that.

Development:

• talking/cooing - he's a chatty little guy, but see above note about feet
• rolling over - ummm, still trying hard on that one; Colin gets about halfway over and decided being on his side is better
• no longer needs to be swaddled, but it still calms him down a lot of the time
• can be put down for a nap/sleep without falling asleep in the arms
• has basically outgrown the Puj (his baby tub)
• almost reached out for me in his first moment of "Mommy, you need to come here and pick me up" when he caught eye contact with me after I had been at the grocery store and didn't come get him as soon as I got home. He also cried really loud then.
• sleeping for long long stretches at night and on a good-night schedule that usually has him asleep within 30-45 min of putting Liam to bed each night (8-10hours of straight sleeping baby = bliss for Momma)

Growth/Doctor Stuff:

• Dr. Honeychurch is still not concerned with Colin's poop-schedule. Yup, Colin is still pooping only once every 3-4 days. Because he's not straining and his belly isn't distended and there's no blood in the stool, he's just not a poopy baby. It's just so weird for a mostly breastfed baby to not poop all damn day. Liam pooped at least 3x/day and he was mostly formula fed by this age.
• Jon thinks Colin's hemangioma is getting smaller. I can't see a difference. Doctor said it would actually shrink from the inside (middle) out so I don't think it is shrinking just yet.
• Both Daddy and I were WAY off on our guesses for how big he would be. We had a bit of a cheat in that we weighed him the day we took Liam in to ask about his fever & rash. Colin was 14 1/2 lbs on that day.
• 15 3/4 lbs (55th percentile)
• 27 1/2 inches tall (99th+ percentile)
• 42 1/2 cm head circumference - my babies have such enormous braincases
• Got more shots at the doc's this time. Only, unlike the 2 month visit, he was not so much of a trooper. And boy was he miserably grouchy for the rest of the day.
• Still mostly breastfed; he takes only about one bottle/day anywhere between 4-6oz of formula.
• Had an allergy attack this week. Basically, seasonal/environmental allergies. Luckily his only reaction was red rimmed eyes and lots of congestion (which led us to haul out the dreaded sot snucker)
  

Where we've gone:

• 4th of July celebration at the Stonehouses. Colin did a little better swimming in their pool than he did in Katherine's pool in June.
• Spent a day at Granny's with Granny and Mannam while we were at a food & wine afternoon with friends.
• We went to the doctor for Liam; ergo we went to ice cream at Ben & Jerry's scoop shop
• We went to Roseville to go shopping for a breast pump adapter for the car; ergo we went to Big Spoon for fro-yo.

Happy 4 months my little man. I love you!!!

big bedtime to-do

So today is sort of a milestone day. Colin is 4 months old today. I hope I'll have a post devoted just to him later this evening (if I'm not too lazy). But there's another milestone that I just had to blog about. When I got up this morning (the actual getting up), my whole family was in the bed!!!

So I guess 2 nights ago, around 3-something in the morning, Liam came into our room and quietly climbed into the bed next to Jon. I guess he would have stayed, but he started whinging for Green Ghost and so Jon went in to get it and by that time Liam was amping up with energy. Jon ended up sleeping in Liam's bed for about an hour before he came back to our bed. All during this time, I slept right through it all and had no clue. If I had known, I would not have kicked Jon out of bed to be with Liam when the kid woke up at 5:45a. Sorry!

Well, this morning, around 5:30, just as the dawn was breaking through our windows, Liam stood in the door of his room and whined a bit. I sat up sleepily and said, "hey kiddo." Whimper whimper "momma," whimper. Then I waved him over as my head was dropping stone-like back onto my pillow. The next thing Jon knew, Liam was scrambling over him trying to climb into the bed. He laid down but needed his Green Ghost. Jon grabbed it and wouldn't you know, within seconds Liam was snuggling into the pillow between us. I held his hand so he would know he was safe (he's never slept in our bed before - so um wow!). Boy has some RANK breath! Serious morning breath/stuffy allergy nose stank going on in that kids pie-hole. At one point he sat up and flopped head first toward the foot of the bed, promptly putting his knees in my chin and feet in Jon's face. I just sat up, grabbed him, and re-righted his little bones back onto the pillow.

At 7a, Colin woke up and wanted his breakfast. It's typical for me to take him back into the bed to nurse him in the morning and sometimes I even get to leave him in the bed with Jon because our new mattress has a sleep spell on my infant when his belly's full. Well I wouldn't leave him this morning with the squirmy preschooler in the bed (he's hard enough to wrangle carefully away from Colin when awake). But as Colin was finishing feeding, I realized my sweet, sleepy family was all in the bed in the morning light. It's not so bad when it's summertime and there's nowhere for us to go/be. We even had one of the cats in the bed. So really truly, almost my entire family was in the bed (Lily isn't exactly allowed on the bed as that's Poppy's territory - oh well). It was a sweet and special milestone. I did get up and change Colin's diaper (which he loves btw) and as he and I were leaving the room, I heard a squeak, so high and loud, I would have thought I had stepped on a toy. But it was Colin, looking at his daddy and big brother, making the coolest exclamation of joy I've ever heard. I'm shocked the bigger boys didn't wake up.

:)

title change

Yeah I changed the title.I really liked the old, original title of this blog, "Life on College Street," but we stopped living on College Street a year ago when we moved. Then I tried to keep the "Life on" idea by switching the name to "Life in Hyperbole." I thought it was okay, but it wasn't really my fave. I figured I was overreative enough to the things in my life that hyperbole was a good choice. But I frankly haven't been on the blog enough to even overreact. Hence I needed to get rid of the name. I'm not all that thrilled with the new name. We do joke that Liam and Colin are now our heir and spare (like we're some kind of royal family right). But I'm not really a princess or feel like one most of the time; although if we could afford it, I'm sure my hubster would treat me like a princess. And of course, I'm leaving the hubs out of the title (although I did put a "froggi pruta" on the graphic). Ugh. And it will probably be a long time until we're living on a cool sounding street again (right now it's 5th and hopefully soon will be living on 6th - seriously, how boring).

Hey. If anyone has a better idea of a name, please feel free to submit.

so far this morning

Liam: Momma, putda sunskeen on Weeum arm. Pweeze!!! Weeum wan peeut butter...peeut butter pop. And watermelon. I hungee hungee patterpillar. I hun-GEE! Dat's Momma's coffee. Weeum mess. Baby Cow'n's forehead! I found my twuck! Hanny Manny missing and da wheel!!!

He's just such a chatty Cathy in the mornings it drives me crazy with cuteness. - Yes, I put sunscreen on his arm even though we're inside and it was only 8:30a, he got a "peanut butter pop" (peanut butter on a spoon) with raisins, stuck his finger in my coffee, drank my cereal milk (that was the mess). Who knows what the deal was with Colin's forehead. He's obsessing over the fact that he can't find his Handy Manny figure or a wheel off of Handy Manny's race car.

All this while he's intermittently singing all his thoughts to "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star" or "Old Mac Donald." Yesterday he decided I was the giant from Jack in the Beanstalk and he kept running from me screaming "Fee fi fo FUH, I smell da inchaman (Englishman). Be 'wive or be dead, grinda bones make da bwead!" Then he would hide under his green ghost on the middle of the bed while I "searched" his room or our room for him. Then he yells, "hidin' unda da bwanket!!!" That kid just doesn't know how to play hide and seek properly yet.

And of course we can't forget his "sand-do-dos" (sandals), especially his "cwokeedile sand-do-dos" his new crocs.

or happy? or sad?

I forgot to add last night the funniest, cutest thing that Liam said yesterday. I went into Liam's room and gave Colin to my hubs (who had spent the better part of an hour trying to get the toddler to nap). When I unlocked the door (yeah that's right, I said they had been locked in), the room smelled distinctly of poopie diaper and Liam said proudly "Weeum diaper is full," and he ran to his changing pad. This is a good thing because it's part of his Good Boy Chart and he gets to have pizza for dinner when he gets to 10 informs on the diaper - which means we all get pizza for dinner :)

When I came back into the room from the trash can, Liam was looking at Colin who was propped on his belly by Jon's belly. "Is Baby Cow'n happy? or sad? or happy? or sad?" Then Colin smiled a huge smile for his brother and then let out a little baby guffaw. "I fink he's happy!!!" Ahh, shot through the heart with cuteness. I also love that that was Liam's first time saying "I think." Man he's getting more and more language in these weeks before his birthday.

been awhile

Sorry that it's been awhile since I've posted. Funny how when I've really got all the time in the world, I never manage to get around to the blog. Maybe it's because I feel like I should have pictures to post each time or something truly amazing to talk about. But then my posts get SOOOOO long. They're probably that long just because it's always so long in between my posts that I feel like I need to get every detail in. Or maybe it's just because I'm long winded and could talk an ear off of something that has a reputation for ears. I do have some pictures from some fun stuff that happened recently. So I will be back posting when I get around to blogging about it. I'll let you know and link to them.

So today, woke up very sleepy to a little man who'd slept all night and didn't wake me up at 3:30 (honestly I don't mind that feeding). I was so full that I had leaked all over my bra and while I was up changing it and Daddy and Colin were in the bed and Coco spit up a good half of what he ate all over my side of the bed. Well that got the two of us out of bed. After I took Liam to preschool, Jon went into YC to do some shopping and have himself a morning alone. I did some elliptical trainer and then had a shower with Colin. He didn't fight me and took a nap like a good little boy. In fact, shhhhh don't tell child protective services, I actually left him sleeping all by himself in his swing while I went to pick up Liam at school.

The garbage disposal backed up again so I didn't want to run the dishwasher. Ugh. Had to wash sheets for today's laundry since there was our sheets with baby barf all over them and Liam leaked a little out of his diaper last night. I should have washed his Green Ghost (blankie) but I completely forgot. Oh well. It;'ll be stinky for awhile. Luckily, he doesn't have to have it every single second of every day so he doesn't worry when it's getting washed. Dinner was a new recipe of grilled Asian chicken salad. It had a peanut soy dressing that was fantastic and had a building spicyness. I served it with broccoli slaw because Jon accidentally bought that instead of coleslaw mix. Here's the link to the recipe; it's a Betty Crocker.

Liam had a pretty good day and got 5 stickers on his Good Boy Chart today. 2 for telling us when he needed his diaper changed, 1 for actually eating his dinner (he also got a slice of cake as his bribe), 1 for picking up toys, and 1 for not throwing a tantrum. Wish he had taken a nap today. Oh well. Both boys were down for bed by 8:15, but then Jon was in reading Liam another story because he got another gust of energy somehow. Then I had a glass of wine and finally got around to posting another blog entry which you are reading now. Tonight should be a quiet night, ahhhh.

Before nap: Momma, Weeum have a beiber.
No you don't. You're cool as a cucumber. 98.2.
Weeum sick. Come in Daddy. Need med'cin. Yeah, purple med'cin.
No sweetheart. You're fine.

After nap: Mommy, Weeum hot. Too hot. Weeum tired. Ouch.
OH! 101.8 Time for medicine and juice.
Night night Baby Cawn. Weeum go back to sweep.

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