Curious Finley Turns Two
jennifer
Just like his first birthday, Finley had an awesome second birthday.  
First, we got to celebrate with Cliff's mom's side of the family.  He got lots of fun gifts, including these underwear hats.
And a rainbow cake for breakfast. 
And his dream come true, his great-grandparents' basement full of electric trains. 
And a rocking horse.  Seriously, does it get any better for a two-year old?

And don't forget riding the tricycle with the perfect spot for his breakfast cupcake. 
And last but not least, a HUGE piece of delicious watermelon. 
Last year, his favorite book was "Goodnight Moon" so we based his party on that.  If you missed it, you can read about turning one here.
This year, he loves Curious George.  It's really the only tv he ever watches (besides the movie, "O Brother, Where Art Thou?" {seriously}), and he loves the books, too.  So, we went with that theme.  It fit perfectly since Finley is such a monkey and so curious!
We designed and printed our invitation.

We made up this stats sign, which was fun to do while looking back at the one we did for his first birthday.  He had only grown about 4 inches and gained about 4 pounds and most of his interests were still the same.  This year, Finley loved walking on the board while I was trying to write, hence the smeared chalk.
We set up a guest book, note jar, and favors at the door.
I only made eight favors for the kiddos, and luckily, exactly eight cousins showed up.  

We used a Curious George birthday book for our guest book.  The jar was given to us at Finley's baby shower with notes from our guests.  Last year, we had birthday guests leave notes and this year we added to it.  Each year, I just use ribbon that coordinates with the party theme, and they look really cute stacking up in the jar and are such a great keepsake.
I just threw together the "Thanks for swinging by!" signs and glued them to paper straws.
We used popcorn tubs and filled them with balloons, suckers, Curious George fruit snacks, a Curious George bookmark to color, and of course banana runts and a real banana.
The fireplace mantle was my favorite part.  My mom put in the elbow grease to make this adorable fabric garland.  We used Curious George books, stuffed monkeys, balloons, a cute Curious George tin piggy bank my mom had on hand, a paper covered wooden 2, and painted Mason jars for decoration.

 We sat the stats sign on the hearth to tie it all together.
When I tried to get his picture there, this is how he posed...  He had the cutest shirt that my parents ordered for him.  On the front it had Curious George decorating a cake with the number two and was personalized with Finley's name.  The back said "It's my birthday!"  Just like Curious George, Finley wasn't still long enough for me to get a good picture.
We named all the food according to Curious George characters, which ended up being really fun.  
We had:
Hundley's Hot Dogs (which we grilled and then kept warm in a crock pot)
 Charkey's Chips
Gnocchi's "Purrrrfect" Potato Salad

Man in the Yellow Hat Deviled Eggs (Shout out to my mom for making these! They were so delicious.)
 Chef Pisghetti's Mac & Cheese
Betsy's Baked Beans (After 30 plates were filled, I swear these beans had not decreased in amount at all.)
 The Renkins' Farm Fresh Veggies & Dip
and Professor Wiseman's Watermelon 
You  may remember from our Goodnight Moon cake last year that our neighbor, Naomi, makes the best cakes you'll ever see. I put together this little banner with scrap paper and paper straws and she did the rest. The little star the monkey is holding is even a candle!  Finley LOVED the cake.
When we sang "happy birthday" Finley hid behind his cake and the table the whole time.  He has suddenly gotten shy over the last week or two.  It was actually really cute though.  He worked really hard to blow out his candle.
As soon as guests arrived, Cliff had our horse out and was giving rides.  The kids loved it.  They also swam in the pool, played in the water table, and had fun with Finn's other outdoor toys.  The adults enjoyed horseshoes. 
 Finley has a fan club of women.
 Fan club continued.
Of course he needed nothing and got everything.  He truly loved everything he got though.  All the new toys were a huge hit with everyone.

And he ended up getting his very own antique collector's rocking horse to keep at home.
 We sat outside with the remaining guests the rest of the evening and enjoyed the beautiful weather.  What better way to end your second birthday than in your birthday suit watching a train go by?
 Or sitting in the perfect size chair?
Now to send our Curious George thank you cards.

0 comments | | edit post
Chicago By Train and Toddler
jennifer
With court being scheduled six months out, we have to really prepare and plan in order to take vacations.  We try to mark three or four weeks off throughout the year so we don't completely lose our minds to the daily grind.  We had marked the last week of July off for a long trip to Michigan (Cliff's old law school stomping grounds), Mackinac Island, and the Upper Peninsula.  Then the morning sickness happened and there was no way we could imagine making the trek.  So, we cancelled our plans.  Then I started feeling normal again and so we decided to still take that week off but just do some day or overnight trips and work around the house and yard.  That was a great idea, except half way through the week, as we were filling the car up with gas, Cliff said, "Man, I wish we were filling up on a big road trip."  So, we decided, spur of the moment, to book some train tickets and head north to Chicago.  My mom was free so she could tag along too.
Chicago may be one of my most visited cities, and if you didn't hear about the last trip I took there with Cliff, you'll want to so you can compare it to this one.
Finley is overly obsessed with trains right now, so he was extremely excited about riding one.  In fact, we literally stood on the platform for thirty minutes watching for the train to arrive.  His focus never wavered.  It may have been the most boring thirty minutes of my life, just staring at empty train tracks.
He really was excited; for some reason he wouldn't smile for this picture.  Probably because I was distracting him from the train.  I also don't remember his outfit looking that funny.

He spent a majority of the trip like this:
And then the last ten minutes like this, which I'm sure is completely against Amtrak's safety policy:

We arrived in Chicago about 10:30pm and had planned to take an Uber to our hotel.  Little did we know, we had scheduled our trip overlapping Lollapalooza (or Lolleep as my mom called it the entire trip because she, for some reason, couldn't say "Lollapalooza".)  There were teenagers Ev.Er.Ee.Where.  Union Station was crammed and buzzing with girls in shorts cut above their butt cheeks and belly revealing spaghetti strap tops (seriously, every.single girl was wearing some version of that outfit) and boys in colorful tank tops or sports jerseys (seriously, every.single boy was wearing some version of that outfit).  So, Uber was like eight times the regular price.  We waded through the kids and jumped in a taxi to our room.

The next day, we did a private walking history and architecture tour of the downtown area.  These are so awesome.  This is the second time we've done this in Chicago.  If you plan at least ten days in advance, you can sign up for a Chicago Greeter tour.  These are two hour walking tours led by a volunteer that is a long time or lifetime resident of Chi Town.  You can pick your category (architecture, history, art, landmarks, etc.)  Since we did not plan ahead for this trip, we did an InstaGreeter tour.  It's only one hour long and you don't pick a category, but it is still really great.  Both tours are 100% free.

Then we went to Millennium Park, which is one of our favorite spots in the Loop.  Finley liked Cloud Gate, but he liked all the girls there better.  Here, he was watching girls while we were trying to take a family selfie.


 Distracted by the girls again...
And finally making his move.



I completely failed at selfies this entire trip, as is evident in this photo, possibly the best I captured while there.

We spent the rest of the day on Navy Pier.  The escalator was probably Finley's favorite part of the pier.

Although, he did like the Ferris Wheel, too.  We timed it perfectly and rode during a small rain shower.

This boy and his dad shared a car with us and Finley made fast friends with the five year old.
A trip to Chicago isn't complete for us unless we've had Giordano's pizza.  This time, we bypassed the eateries and had it delivered straight to our hotel room.  The best part of the pizza this time was that I ordered it with green peppers on half.  When I opened the box and saw this, I thought they had only put green peppers on that ONE piece.  Cliff, who is much smarter than me, especially when I have pregnancy brain, could hardly keep a straight face to explain it signified that half of the pizza had the green peppers.

The next day we went to the Lincoln Park zoo.  It is a very neat and clean little zoo, and again, totally free!  Finley could not understand why he couldn't chase the zoo birds like he chases our free range chickens at home.

Of course, his favorite part was this over-priced three minute train ride that we did over and over and over again.

 Finn fell asleep for his afternoon nap, so we took advantage of the Chicago History Museum.  It was very neat and more kid-friendly than I had expected.  Cliff and I went on strike for civil rights while there.
 Once again, Finley's (and Cliff's) favorite part was Chicago's first train.
Dad is playing as much as son here.

 We watched Chicago shrink away as we took the train back home early Sunday morning.
We all got comfy in our seats and took a good nap.

We made it home later that afternoon and agreed it had been a very fun spontaneous vacation.  
The train is my favorite way to travel with or without a kiddo, but with a toddler it is thee best.  You can get up and walk the aisles, sit in the reserved family seats that face each other, hang out in the dining car, have plenty of room, plug in your electronics, and the other travelers always seem to be so nice.  And no matter what you're doing on the train, you're still moving toward your destination!

0 comments | | edit post
Where I've Been...Again
jennifer
So I have once again been MIA.  Unfortunately, it's still not because we were wintering in Spain, but because we have another little boy on the way; due in November.  In case you don't remember how terrible the first trimester of pregnancy is for me, you can re-read this post from April 2014.
Yep, everything was the same this time, except I was working at the office more and chasing a toddler around.  However, the bonus is we're not running a campaign this time.
While running to the bathroom to vomit multiple times a day during the first three months, I tried to make myself believe I was just like Duchess Kate Middleton, who suffers from Hyperemesis Gravidarum during her pregnancies, but it's really hard to make yourself believe that when you're wearing no pants, no bra, and have no servants or nannies to take care of everything for you.  But, we have finally moved through to the second trimester and I'm feeling good, even if I am still exhausted all the time.  Luckily, I do have a husband and parents who really pitch in and take care of everything, except the nausea and vomiting--I really wish someone would step up to the plate and take on that every once in awhile for me.
So, our life is basically put on hold for the first three months of pregnancy--all our social engagements are cancelled, the bare minimum is done around the house and yard, and the same goes for the office.  Then, once I'm finally feeling better, it takes at least a month to try to catch back up on everything and get back into our routine.  And then we want to make up for all the fun we missed out on.  So, what have we been doing---
I did hold my breath through a couple of family birthday and graduation parties and just crossed my fingers I could make it through.  Same for the Clifton Hill School Reunion, where Cliff and I are the youngest attendees by at least 40 years (somehow I got delegated to make the programs). 
The first weekend in June, we had a weekend trip planned to south Missouri.  Knowing I would be 14 weeks along by then--and thinking positively--I was sure I would be over my morning sickness and ready for a getaway.  I was so wrong.  I was not through with morning sickness.  The trip there on four land highway wasn't terribly bad, as long as I kept a piece of candy in my mouth at all times.  But, we decided to be adventurous on the way home and take the "back roads."  On top of that, I get carsick easily when I'm not pregnant, so the two did not mix well.  I was literally crying in the backseat for the last two hours of the trip, trying to get comfortable beside a giant carseat.  Needless to say, that trip involved multiple disgusting stops along the route.  I don't know if I have ever been so glad to get out of a car and throw up in my own bathroom. 
Elephant Rocks State Park


Elephant Rocks State Park


By the next weekend, I was finally feeling a little better.  We put one of our two 1960s firetrucks in the Salisbury Steak Festival parade.  It was a hit and Finley was a natural parade waver.  Finley was also a huge hit at a live concert by Bart & Red that evening.  He was a serious dancer with some serious moves, and he had no plans of stopping.


All but one family on my dad's side (and there are 9 kids, 18 grandkids, and 16 great-grandkids) made it in over the Fourth of  July.  We celebrated my cousin's wedding and had games, food and a hayride at my parents' house.  I was feeling 100% better by then, so a good time was had by all!

Since then, we've been on a roll.  Things are non-stop at the office, at home, and in our social life.  Just like last time, some days I forget I'm pregnant and drink a case of beer...I mean...no, really though, other than being tired, things are going well.  Stay tuned for more adventures that don't include vomiting, at least not vomiting by me.
0 comments | | edit post