...or "Reason #1042 why Ben will hate me when he gets older"

Kinda busy today, working and doing dis n dat...

It was a great wedding, even though we could only attend the reception. More later once I process the pictures...gotta work and watch Da Bears!

Surprisingly, the first time I took Ben to a playground was last weekend. We go to the zoo, Chuck-e-Cheese and aquariums all the time, but I had never taken him to just a regular playground. He goes with his grandfather all the time, but I was still surprised when I saw him walk right up to one of the play structures, climb up the stairs, and go down the big slide (I had to catch him, since he's too short to reach the ground at the end of the slide). He was by far the littlest kid on the playground, but he held his own and most of the kids were patient and waited for him to climb up the stairs or gently made their way around him (except for that one punk that stepped on Ben's fingers). Anyway, here's some pics:

He looks so big here! He's so brave!

I admit, I was so busy taking this picture I forgot to catch him and he fell. Like 6 inches onto the soft ground. Someone call DCFS!

Playing with sand

For some reason he loves to clean the playground. He found a twig and handed it to me. On the stairs for the slide, he made sure to hand me any wood chips that were on the steps. Weirdo.

What a cutie pie!

I miss my little daredevil! I'm going home tomorrow!

I'm running on about 6 hours of sleep over the last 2 days. That usually wouldn't be THAT big of a problem except that I've been really sick lately, with a painful cough and I have no voice. Sometimes I sound like a secy Demi Moore, most times I sound like a scary trucker.

Dave and I got sick at around the same time (from Benjamin, the source of all our colds) and he's been OK since labor day. I'm sure its a combination of a number of things that are affecting my road to wellville.

*sigh*

*cough*

Had a great time at the comicon, I'll have a full report soon!

Last Saturday we headed out to our second Cubs game of the year, Ben's third. It was pretty uneventful, and the Cubs, unfortunately, lost. There were these guys behind us that were totally enchanted with Benjamin, and wanted badly to teach him how to open and eat a peanut. Ben, however, had other plans, and proceeded to turn around the peanut in his hands and chew on the shell. After he got bored of that, his new game was "jam the peanut in Mommy's mouth" which he found really hilarious.

I don't think I made up a post of our first Cubs game of the year, which was a lot more eventful than this one, so I'll turn back the clock and talk about that one.

Those of you who had watched the All Star game a couple weeks back may have remembered the announcers mentioning it and showing a replay - it was the fight in which the normally good natured Derreck Lee got into a fight with the Padres pitcher Chris Young.

It was Ben's second Cubs game, and we were a little nervous bringing him, considering that the last time we brought him he had cried for the first 5 innings. Then again, he was only 6 months old then.

I put him in his Cubs gear and his brand new Cubs hat (his old one was lost at the mall) and we headed out to the ballpark. Our seats were in the shade, so we didn't have to worry about too much sun exposure. Dave wasn't with us since he was cramming for his exam, so it was me, Dave's dad, his brother and his brother's girlfriend.

Ben was much more well behaved this time around, amazed by the people who were going to the seats in the upper level, passing by on a walkway several sections away from us. He also watched the game a bit, but he had no idea what was going on. He was happy enough watching people go by and munching on french fries.

I was only paying half-attention to the game, but I heard the crowd go "Ohhh!" and I looked at the batter, Derrek Lee, on the ground. I figured he got hit by a pitch, and he got up slowly to take his base. He started walking towards the base and by that time, a lot of people in the crowd had already anticipated what was going to happen next, since they were already standing. Then everyone started shouting and hooting and it took me a second to comprehend why Derrek was halfway to the pitcher's mound. Turns out that words were said by the pitcher, Chris Young, to Derrek as he was about to take base, and Derrek didn't like the attitude, since he was the one hit by a pitch. Then all of the sudden, the benches of both teams are on the field, everyone's cheering, cameraphones are up in the air and the whole crowd is standing up. Poor little Ben was wondering what the hell was going on. Only then did I realize that I had my camera, too, but by then, the mini-brawl was already over.

What was interesting about the fight was that Derrek Lee and Chris Young are two of the tallest guys in baseball, with Young at 6'10" and Lee at 6'5". Two big guys going after each other, both being restrained by their team. If you had watched the replay on TV, it was pretty funny, because pitcher Carlos Zambrano was just getting out of the locker room to find the fight on field, and he was running onto the field while still putting on his belt. To someone who didn't know, it just looked like he whipped of his belt to spank someone.

The rest of the game was pretty awesome, with Zambrano having a no hitter until late in the 8th. We lost, though, which was a bummer.

Anyway, here's our pictures for the game....enjoy!

We sat Benjamin in the seat in front of us, and he made a new friend

Ben eats nachos on his godfather Justin's lap

Z almost had a no hitter that day!

Fight! Fight!

Ben watches the action behind us

Busy busy, once again, but not as busy as before. Anyway, here's some pictures to wish you a good Sunday...

Kudos to whoever knows where the title comes from...

Pretty busy this weekend and today...then again, life's been busy for a while now!

In Atlanta...been here since Monday. It's hot, rainy and humid here. Forgot laptop adapter at the client site, running out of juice, so just a quick post for today.

Took this picture at the zoo the other day. This little baby giraffe was having a fun time running around his pen. I love how you can see his reflection on the water. Ben had a good time watching!

It's only been one day since I've seen my little Beeny, and I'm already missing him. It's going to be a tough 3 weeks!

I love taking pictures of Ben and Dave together. Unfortunately, since I'm the photographer in the family, I don't have many pictures with Benjamin. I'll have to remember to take a couple of the two of us, just so he has some baby pictures with his beloved Mommy to post when he gets a blog of his own.

Here's a favorite of mine, taken at a party a couple weeks ago...

Last Sunday, we went to Ben's cousin's birthday party. She had a big shindig, with balloon artists, face painters, cotton candy machines, the works! There were even pony rides. So of course, I've gotta get a picture of my son on a pony, even if he didn't really care for the pony (although he did like it after a bit, and even petted his pony's mane). Just wanted to share the picture with y'all!

It's incredible how big Benjamin has gotten. Not big like a regular 13 month old - he's still pretty small for his age, but big in that he's got such a personality and it seems like he's a little boy already. I love spending time with him because he's so much fun. He climbs, rolls, laughs, giggles and hides. It's hard to imagine that a year ago he was this little blob that only pooped, peed, cried and ate.

Last Saturday, we went to Sammy's 2nd birthday party. It was the first time that we all have gotten together with our little tykes in a very long time. In the last two months, Ben has gotten two more new friends, both little boys. So right now, we've got all boys in our group of friends, and no girls. In a couple years, there's going to be a ton of little boys running around, and no little girls. It's weird how out of a group of friends, all six babies are little boys. If I extend it to my family and other friends, then I can throw in nine more babies. The only person I know of who has had a baby girl (and has another girl on the way) is Dave's cousin. So of the seventeen babies that have been born in the last two years, only two have them have been girls. Crazy, right?

Anyway, here's the pics from the birthday...

It's been a while since I've done a Ben collage. Then again, it's been pretty hard to keep him on one place to take the pictures. Before, I'd just throw him on the bed and make noises so I could get all the different faces. Now, it's a little harder to make him go through so many faces in one sitting. It's funny how his face hasn't changed much. If you look at the three month collage, he still looks the same. But this time, he's got his crazy bangs and 6 teeth...

Click for the mega-view.

Guess whose butt this is. No fair saying who it is if you already know.

When you figure it out, you'll want to gauge your eyes out, then giggle with girlish glee.

It's been snowing here for the past couple days. I was thinking that we weren't going to get anymore snow since it had been such a dry winter for us, but I was definitely wrong!

Yesterday traffic was moving slowly on the way to the train - yes, I'm working in the city this week. The perfect time for the snow to come down. I'm doing a training class and all of my clients are from somewhere in the South, so they're not used to this weather. On Monday it wasn't too bad - no snow and a warm (compared to last weeks below zero temps) 20 degrees. But yesterday was an adventure! We went to lunch at Rock Bottom and when we got out, the wind was blowing the snow everywhere. It would blow it into our faces and it felt like little pinpricks. Some of them screamed. I laughed. Not the side of Chicago that visitors want to see!

Once I got back to the train station to where my car was parked, it was like a field of snow covered cars. Some smart neighborhood kids, snowbrushes in hand, were offering to clean snow off cars for $2. I was pretty tempted to take them up on their offer!

After 10 minutes of cleaning and heating my car (which didn't really matter since the wind was blowing the snow back on my car anyway) I headed home. Since the snow was being carried by the wind, most of the work that the snowplows did was gone after 10 minutes. Cars on the road were left to guess where the lanes were. People were sliding here and there and I even passed a pretty bad accident on my 5 minute drive home.

But I'm safe and sound, ready to brave the winter weather again. Wish me luck!

For a while I was wondering if Ben would ever get teeth. He was 8 months old and still hadn't had any teeth come in, but had been drooling and gnawing on things for months. Finally, he had two little teeth come in on the bottom. Two weeks later, he had three teeth come in the top, and a week after that another tooth at the top.

It was so cute to see his teeth come in, especially the little gap in his middle front teeth. It looks like he's going to have big beaver teeth like me.

It was totally adorable.

Until he bit me.

HARD.

I was carrying him in my arms and he was burrowing into my shoulders, and all of the sudden a sharp pain on my shoulder. I screamed and tried to pull him off and after a second he came off. Then the little bugger started laughing because he thought it was a game.

Well, at least I'm not the only one he bites - he bit my father in law, too.

Fortunately, that seemed to be a one time incident. I've caught him biting on my shirt numerous times, but no more painful bites.

Oh well, I've got to forgive him...especially when he's looking this cute!

This blog needs a dose of Ben to bring my out of my post-Superbowl-loss funk!

Playing with the swing he no longer uses

I got him some knee pads because he loves to crawl on the hardwood. He looks like a little volleyball player.

He loves remote controls, but only the ones that are functional. He knows if we give him the ones we don't normally use (like the VCR) that have the batteries removed. In this picture he looks a lot like Dave.

He loves his cheese! This pic was taken right before his top 4 teeth came in...

I was in Rochester a couple weeks ago for training, and pretty much every night we had some sort of activity with the group. One night we were on our own for dinner, so me and a coworker decided to find a nice seafood place to eat. We had a GPS in the car (you know, like those TomToms) and it had a directory of restaurants in there. The closest seafood place to our hotel was called "The Lobster Trap." Mmm...lobster!

We headed out to the Trap, letting our GPS give us directions. Finally, it said, "You have arrived at the destination." We saw a shopping center with a grocery store, but no sign of the Lobster Trap. We circled around again in the parking lot, but couldn't find it. We decided to call the place:

Us: Hi, we used our GPS to find your restarant, but we can't seem to find it.
Him: Where are you?
Us: We're at the Ford dealership down the street from the Tim Horton's.
Him: We're right across the street from Tim Horton's.
Us: Oh. Are you across the street from the Wegman's supermarket, too?
Him: No, we're in the same shopping center.
Us: Oh really? We just went through there and couldn't find it.
Him: We're at the Citgo.
Us: The Citgo?
Him: Yeah. Right there.

We looked at each other, confused..."AT the Citgo?" Meaning, inside?

So we drove back to the shopping center, and lo and behold, there was a Citgo right in the middle, right by the street. We drove past, and there it was, a little shack connected to the gas station - the Lobster Trap, looking like the scariest place to eat that I have ever seen in my life.

We stopped, I took a picture, and eventually found an excellent bistro in this cute little part of town where I had the best scallops ever.

Sorry, Lobster Trap, I like my Lobster with butter, not unleaded.

We went to Bob Chinn's on Friday for our company holiday party - all 12 of us who are left from X-Systems (who are all now part of X-Inc), plus the new guy that was hired to do our programming. It was so nice to spend time with my coworkers, who I never get to see anymore since we all work from home now. You never realize how much you crave conversation with coworkers until you have no one to talk to during your work day. It was fun to talk about the good old days, and laugh about how eerily "The Office" episodes mirrored what happened at X-Systems.

I downed some Mai Tais but had to stop myself because I didn't want to puke all over my food. It's nice to be able to drink and not have to worry about nursing, but my tolerance has gotten so low! I had to watch myself to make sure I wasn't talking too loud or giggling too much.

Here's my meal, the Ex-Crab-aganza. It contains three different kinds of crab, though I don't remember what kinds. Maybe stone crab, kona crab and something else. I didn't really care, I just wanted a lot of crab, and as you can see, this was definitely a LOT of crab! It was as delicious and filling as it looks!

Here's my annual "Year of Pictures" thread. I tried not to put in TOO many pictures of Ben, but it was hard to choose my favorites!

Enjoy!

Merry Christmas everyone! We had a long, fun night, and I have many pictures to post later. For now, here's my serious kid and Santa Clause!

Melanie has a cute set of pictures she took last weekend when we were at Trully's watching the Bear's game. As I've said, Ben is pretty chill and serious when we're out in public so it's hard to get him to smile or show any emotion. But after a little bit of coaxing, she got some cute smiles on her camera.

You can also see his spiffy new haircut!

Since I miss my little man, I'll make another post about him...

We went to a party at Chuck E. Cheese several weeks ago and Ben had a ball on the rides. He's still pretty serious when we're out of the house, but I could tell he liked it because he was so intent on grabbing the steering wheel and moving it around. He's still a little too small for the rides, but fortunately most of them have safety belts. For some of the rides he couldn't even reach the steering wheel, making him a little frustrated. So we stuck with the rides he could fit in and he didn't mind riding them over and over.

He's growing so fast! *cries*

Today is World AIDS Day, a day to bring awareness to the ongoing battle against AIDS. Here are some sad facts about AIDS:

Every year 3 million people die from AIDS. Of the 40 million people infected by HIV/AIDS, Africa (which has just over 10% of the world’s population) is home to 60% (25 million). The disease is the leading cause of death in Africa.

Women comprise the fastest growing population group living with HIV/AIDS in Sub-Saharan Africa and the result of their illness on children is compelling. Every time a man or woman is started on anti-retroviral drugs, the survival of children becomes less precarious.

An estimated 13 million children in Africa have been orphaned because of HIV/AIDS already and this number is growing. Almost 2000 children, most of them from sub-Saharan Africa, are infected with HIV each day.

The saddest thing is that AIDS is a preventable, treatable disease, but many of those who have it, especially in developing countries, do not have the access to treatment.

Bono, who is one of the people trying hard to bring awareness to this epidemic, has started a campaign called the (Red) Campaign. He's teamed up with The Gap, American Express, myspace, Converse and many other companies to create products where part of the proceeds go to The Global Fund, an organization made up of companies, countries and individuals brought together to finance the war on AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis in developing areas.

You may have seen the Gap ads on billboards, on bus stops or at your local Gap store.

I decided to do my part and get some awareness out there and make my own Gap ad. Some of you may remember Apolo Anton Ohno, short track Olympic gold medal winner at the Olympics...and some of you may recognize the handsome guy on the right...

I still sleep with Benjamin in our bed because he's my little teddybear. However, by the time morning comes, this is pretty much what happens. I'm pushed off the side of the bed, having less than a foot of room on the bed. He's a bed hog!

Just a preview of the Thanksgiving pictures that I'm going to eventually post. I've also got pictures from the Minneapolis Science museum, and yummy sushi pictures. I just haven't had the time because my regular sitter (Dave's dad) is out of town and I've had to drive Ben around town to whoever can babysit him. I've also had several things due for work so that's been sucking any of the free time I have.

I miss my blog!

We've had Ben-eater on solids for the last several months. For some reason he likes to eat with his foot outside of the highchair. Weirdo.

To end my week of Halloween, I present to you Spiderboy. I went to the Halloween store the day after the holiday and got some great deals, like this cute Spiderman costume. Sure, Ben will be too big to wear it next year, but it was too cute to pass up. We laughed so hard when we put it on him - he HATED the mask. For the longest time he kept his eyes shut when the mask was on him. Unfortunately, he figure out how to take it off so every time we put the mask on him he immediately grabs it and pulls it down. One funny thing is everytime he had the mask on, he would hold his arms out to his sides as if trying to catch his balance - it was so cute!

Enjoy the pics!

Halloween isn't over yet here on YWIM! I've been so busy/tired/sleepy this week I haven't had a chance to post as often as I've wanted, so there's a lot of backlogged posts I want to make.

Anyway, here's one more Benjamin photoshop Halloween picture!

FrankenBen

Last weekend I met up with the "cousins with kids" at the Brookfield Zoo. Every year they have Halloween festivities there and I've always been curious as to what happens there. Turns out there are TONS of people who go, but it was a lot of fun seeing all the different costumes that all the little kiddies had. Looks like this year was very popular for fairies, princesses and superheroes. It seemed like everywhere I turned there was a Spiderman lurking about!

My Godson Kenzo Gets a Leaf Shower

I brought Benjamin and dressed him up in his beaver costume. He was pretty unimpressed by the whole deal. I'm sure he was a little bummed that he wasn't able to run around with Jillian and Kenzo in their costumes...but at least his buddy Jacob was in the same boat - he can't walk either!

Benjamin Poses on the Lawn

I need to start teaching Benjamin how to identify animals so he can point at them with glee when he sees them at the zoo. "Look Mommy! A lion!" "Look Papa! An okapi!" "See that tapir swimming?!?" Right now, it's just these moving things to him. He was just watching everything go by - little kids, the animals, the sky, leaves blowing about...he just soaks it all in.

This Was His Expression For Most of the Day

The funnest (is funnest a word? well, it is now!) part of the day was when we were playing in the leaves. Kenzo had a ball throwing the leaves up in the air, and the kids went crazy running around. I even took Ben out of his stroller and set him on the ground. He was immediately intrigued by the leaves, picking them up and trying to eat them. I got them out of his hands before he had a chance to put them in his mouth. However, after I put him in his stroller, wiped his hands and got my stuff together, I found that he had a leaf in his hands and he was sticking it in his mouth! I had no idea where he got it, since his hands were empty only seconds before. He's a tricky little guy!

The Kids Play Around in the Leaves

It was a good time...not sure if I'd do it again, there were just so many people there! I probably will, since I'm a zoo member and I get in free anyway. I can't wait til next year when Ben's able to run around with the other kids and really enjoy himself with his cousins!

Click here for more pics!

Still a bit busy with work and taking care of Ben...maybe I'll have more time tomorrow night as I'm waiting for trick or treaters...

Ben the Shark

This isn't his costume for this Halloween, it's still pretty big on him. He'll probably wear it next year or just 'whenever' during the year. Because there's lots of occasions where you can dress up as a shark!

Had a long and incredibly busy weekend. I'm currently running on about 3 hours of sleep, but it's my own fault for pushing some things to the last minute.

Anyway, I have a TON of awesome pictures that I think I took this weekend (not sure if they turned out nice since I haven't uploaded them to my computer yet) but I'll post those later.

So for now, another "just so I have something to post on my blog" post...another photoshopped Ben halloween picture:

Benny Potter

I'm training all week and I have several other deadlines, so you don't get a quality post from me today...

But to make up for it, here's some more photoshop fun:

Benbo the Clown

Cute, funny, and a little creepy!

I miss 'em.

Today is my godson's first birthday party, and the theme of the party is Curious George. Since I wanted to make something that went along with the theme, I saw a couple designs for monkey cupcakes and created my own twist.

I made some banana cupcakes, used some milk chocolate frosting (it's lighter than regular frosting), 3/4 of a regular Nilla Wafer, 2 halves of a Mini Nilla Wafer, and some black and red gel icing for the eyes, nostrils and mouth. They turned out a lot better than I anticipated, though it took a couple tries before I figured what the best design for the eyes. I'm pretty proud of them!

Oh my, I'm turning into a homeroom mom!!!

Oh no! It's been almost a week since I've posted a picture of BeeBo!

As I said earlier, Benjamin's 4 months old today. He's extremely chatty, can sleep for 7 hours without waking (when I'm lucky), loves to chew on his hands, and is starting to enjoy tummy time. It's really amazing to see him learn something new, or do some new action I've never seen before. I could literally sit there for hours watching him. He's my little snugglebunny!

For this month's collage, I decided to try something new. Since Ben Pao's can lift his head from a tummy position, we wanted to have our collage using that pose.

...but I'll probably get bored of this blog or moved on to a new one by the time he's old enough to care, so it doesn't matter anyway...

Ben Booty

Ben is now able to lift up his head from the tummy position. He's not as fussy anymore when he has tummy time, though after about 10 minutes he starts complaining. Dave's dad was taking care of Ben and I heard him laughing at Bebop up in the nursery. I came up to see Benjamin naked on a blanket. He looked so adorable that I ran to get my camera and take a couple shots...this one is my favorite!

I'm in class this week so I don't have much time to update...I'm too pooped when I get home to do anything constructive.

Anyway, here's my favorite pic of Ben taken last weekend, from Claud and Redpac:

It makes me laugh.

You all know that I love taking pictures. I adore my little Olympus Camedia - he's always been a good little bugger with his awesome 10x zoom.

But I admit that as of late, I've been longing for another camera. I'm a member of flickr, and I'm always amazed at the beautiful pictures that the other members have. The lighting is just right, there's no motion blur, they have this soft, focused quality that I like. What do most of these photographers have in common? A digital SLR camera.

What's SLR? Well, it stands for "Single Lens Reflex", and essentially, it's a higher grade, more professional camera that allows for more manual control. You can use different lenses and there isn't that lag time after taking a picture that many regular digital cameras have.

Sometimes it feels like everyone has one! (but I know that that's not true)

Maui let me play around with his Canon 10D during our 4th bbq. I was like a kid in a candy store, snapping pictures non-stop. He showed me the different lenses and how to focus. Some people go to amusement parks for fun - just put a good camera in my hands in a backyard full of little kids and I'm having a ball!

Melanie posted up some of my better ones (some of them were taken by other people ) on her photosite, so you can check them out.

Here's a couple of my favorites:

Little Jacob

My godson Kenzo - capturing this on my current camera may have had some motion blur

This pic of my cutie patootie was taken in a room with little light. I was able to adjust the ISO and shutter speed to give it a little more light - also, there was minimal noise in the original picture - something that my camera creates a lot of at an ISO higher than 100.

I just threw this in here because Kenzo's so cute!

As I said before, I love my camera, it takes great pictures. But I can't help wanting something that I can use to get better quality pictures. I've always struggled with getting enough light to get a good picture and noise at a higher ISO level. From the tests that I did with Maui's camera, those issues aren't as bad as a regular point and shoot.

Sadly, an SLR isn't in my near future. We just don't have the cash flow for one - even the ones that I've found on ebay. We just got a new desktop computer, had several weddings to attend this year, and there was that whole baby thing...New SLR cameras start at about $800. *sigh*

One day...oh yes, one day I will get my SLR...and the pictures will be GLORIOUS!

:-P

...thanks to Kat and Texas Kristine's camera, I've got a picture of my failed attempt at being an awesome cake decorator...

Sure, the lettering is crap and the top border has melted down to the bottom, but damn, it tasted GREAT!

Click on the photo for my pictures from Claudine and Dan's wedding:

Melanie has a TON of pictures on her site that she gathered from her own camera, Maui, and the Texas ladies:

I was thinking that maybe we could all have one place to post our favorite pictures from the wedding, so I started a flickr group that everyone can join. I know that a ton of you had cameras and took pictures and several of you who don't have your own websites do have flickr accounts (it's free to join!). So if you want, join the flickr group and add your pics (yes, I'm talking to YOU, Marilyn!)! That way Claudine and Dan have somewhere they can go to look at the pictures from their wedding.

http://www.flickr.com/groups/claudine_and_dan/

Dave was on call yesterday at the hospital, so we decided to celebrate Father's Day today.

It's Dave's first father's day, and he's really excited to spend it with Benjamin. It's amazing how easily Dave has transformed into a father - from changing diapers to entertaining the baby with a whole assortment of noises, games, and baby talk. Ten years ago if you would have asked me what kind of father Dave would be, I would never have imagined him to be the father he is today. He's a completely different person! It really warms my heart to see him interact with his son.

So I hope he has a great day today. We want to do a lot of activities, but I bet we're just going to take a long nap to rest after such a busy weekend. But that's a treat, too, since it's our favorite past time!

So to end my post, I wanted to share my favorite photo of Benjamin so far, just because it was such a candid moment that I caught...Dave had just gotten home from working 24 hours with no sleep and he was exhausted. I needed to take a shower so I asked him to watch the baby and he groggily agreed. I put the baby down in his arms and Dave was talking to him.

When I got back into the room, Dave was fast asleep but I could see Benjamin's arms flailing around next to him. I approached the bed to get a closer look and saw that Benjamin was lying in his father's arms, just laughing and entertaining himself. It was so adorable! Luckily, I got a terrific picture to capture the moment!

It seems that since little Ben was born, most of his pictures are either of him or him and his papa and/or other people, but there are not too many pics of him and his mother. Why? Because someone has to be behind the camera!

So, to make sure that there are SOME pictures of me and my baby out there, I decided to take a pic of just the two of us.

Isn't he adorable?

Ben's growing more every day, and his face is constantly changing. He's lost a little of his baby fat so his face is a little slimmer now. These little photo shoots are pretty fun to do, I love trying to catch his different expressions!

Anyone who's seen the movie "Garden State" will know what scene I'm referring to. Benjamin got a lot of presents, one of them was a onesie/blanket combo that had the same pattern. As soon as I saw it I knew I had to take this picture!

It's Benjamin's one month birthday today! It's amazing that one month has passed already - it just seems like yesterday that I gave birth to him. Then again, it feels like I've had him forever.

Every day he grows bigger and bigger. He was such a tiny thing when he was born - now he's got chubby little legs and arms. Everyone we've talked to tells us to cherish this first year - the baby will grow quickly. I've seen the kids of my friends and though it feels like they were born yesterday, they're so big now!

Here's his first picture:

...and here's a picture we took today:

Happy birthday, my little chimichanga!

This warning was on the packaging of my new laptop, as well as my new desktop. They're different brands, so I'm assuming that this is now the universal symbol for "If You Have No Nose and Slanty Eyes, Don't Put This Bag Over Your Head".

It creeps me out.

One of my favorite things to do is take a nap with little Benny. I'm a little paranoid that I'll roll over on him and squoosh him, so I sleep very lightly, but it's such a great feeling to sense him so close, to hear his quick inhales and exhales.

My camera now lives in the baby's room, always having fresh batteries so it's always ready to catch any precious moment that may arise. I love to take little candid pictures of Dave and the baby, and Dave has become quite the photographer and I'll often find pics I haven't taken on my memory card.

So here's a couple of us doing our favorite thing, sleeping with our little BenBurrito.

I'm using what internet time I have today to clean out a massive amount of spam I got yesterday. Spammers should be naked, covered with honey, tied to a tree with a hive of angry bees thrown at them. But this blog has been so empty lately I decided to throw up a picture of little BenBen. I think I'll throw up a couple more tonight when I get on my desktop.

He totally doesn't look like this anymore, but here's a cute pic that was taken a couple weeks ago when he was a little more than a week old...

Winky

[flickr's having problems with pics right now...]

I'm going to start getting the birth announcements together, but I want to take a good picture for it. So last week baby and I had a little photo shoot. I had him wear one of the Cubs jerseys he got (he has about 8 Cubs outfits, thanks to all who gave them to us!) and his baseball blanket in the background.

It's kinda hard to take pictures of him since he has NO attention span right now, and it's not like he can pose or anything. I basically have to wait for moments and make sure I capture them on film.

Anyway, here's some of the outtakes. I still haven't chosen a picture so one of these may be the winner. Then again, I just may have another photo shoot since he doesn't even look like this anymore!

I have to admit, my baby is adorable! I can stare at him for days!

The sad thing, though, is that he doesn't smile on cue yet. He only smiles when he's pooping or falling asleep, and those times are so hard to catch! I'm waiting for when he actually starts smiling on his own. But for now, I decided to give him some help...

I've finally got the pictures up from Benjamin's first days of life, and all the people who came to visit in those first couple days...click on the first picture to go to the flickr photo album:

Happy Easter from Dave, Me and our little Duckling!

I went "home" the other day - "home" being the house I grew up in where my dad and sisters still live. They've got this massive project where they're cleaning out the attic, which we've been using for storage. Looks like we've got too much stored up there and it's starting to cause some cracks in the wall so they're throwing a lot of the crap we've stored up there over the 25 years we've lived there out.

I'm a horrible packrat, keeping memorabilia in shoe boxes and folders in crates, thinking that one day I'll go through them and get misty at all the memories I've had, only to be put away again back in the attic. I went over the house to check out my share of accumulated crap and to throw away the things I really don't need and just keep the essentials.

Damn, I had a LOT of crap. I was there for 4 hours and I'd only gotten through 1/3 of my stuff.

But what stuff it was! It was a wonderful trip down memory lane, bringing back memories that my poor little brain has chosen to keep buried deep inside. I knew a lot of this stuff wouldn't fit in our new house (and Dave is the OPPOSITE of a pack rat...he rarely keeps anything!) so I knew that I had to throw a lot of it away. It was sad to part with a lot of the things I found - old candles from formals in highschool, pages and pages of letters from highschool and from friends, old movie tickets, dried flowers, etc.

I did keep a lot of things, like all my old pictures that I had hanging up in hand-decorated picture frames, postcards, my old art supplies, and other stuff that wouldn't take up too much room in my new place.

It's a bit sad to let go of a lot of these memories, my memory is so horribly spotty that I need these things to reawaken old feelings and remind me of good days gone by. But I'm entering a new stage in my life, so I feel a bit better about putting these things to rest.

I did, however, take a couple pictures of some of the things that I was going to throw away before they got launched into that big black hole of a hefty garbage bag...

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles button (featuring my favorite turtle, Donatello), Belle figurine, my first pager (that I really don't remember ever using), book of matches from PSA formal '97, Cozumel fish key chain, Christmas ornamants that we passed around during a party to have decorated...

My ex-boyfriends old bumblebee fuzzy slippers...if you're out there, Henry, they're going to a better place...

Little Mermaid button collection, duck-bill straw, Psych Grad School stuff (I was thinking of going, then decided I never want to go back to school again), my prom date's bow tie...

Potpourri pillows created during our girls' crafting night, a gift wrapped, empty box with a poem on the front, and my ever present Pochaco photo wallet...

Glass from PSA formal '95, glass from AAA formal '97, glass from PSA formal '97, glass rose from Sweethearts Dance '90....

I think there was a ton more crap that I threw away without taking a pic of them, but these are the ones that i felt I needed to have a visual to remember them...

[updated below for the flickr-handicapped]

I've got my Chicago Home and Garden pics up, there aren't too many that turned out well, but some of them are pretty nice...click on the picture to get to the gallery!

Thanks to Noelle's request, I've created a little map on how to scroll through the pics without having to return to the main thumbnail page - there is a box on the right where you can click on the next picture or click on "more" to scroll through the thumbs until you find a thumbnail you want to click on...

When I was a little kid, I hung out at the library a lot. Across from the library was a Metra station. The Metra is the train system that connects the suburbs to the city. I'd always check out the train, wondering what kind of people rode on there. I'd ridden the "L", the Chicago subway system often as a kid with my parents. I was used to messy trains, shady characters, and keeping my valuables close to me. People who rode the "L" were inner city people, middle to low class, sometimes we'd have the occasional yuppies on there, but there really wasn't a "yuppy" area when I was a kid.

So I'd check out this Metra. These trains that stopped at a special station. What I found so fascinating with these trains was that they were double deckers. There were two levels of people who could ride on the train, and I would try to peer through the tinted green class to see how they did it. The train would stop, well dressed businessmen and women would climb out and go to their cars, their briefcases in tow. I imagined a whole bunch of rich people, drinking champagne and living the good life on the Metra. To me, anyone who lived in the suburbs was rich, they had a better life, the kids got everything they wanted and didn't have to share anything. "One day, I'll ride that Metra!" I thought to myself.

The Metra

So now I ride it all the time to get to work, since I moved to the suburbs. I totally had the wrong impression of the suburbs! Not all suburbs are rich, and the Metra isn't this amazing, wonderful first class train. It looks pretty ordinary inside. However, it IS a lot cleaner and safer than the subway. I can work on my laptop without worrying about someone punching me to steal it. But it wasn't as magical as I thought it would be...

The inside of the Metra

Also, in a weird way, I miss that musky, dank, basement-like smell of the subway stations, as well as the entertaining street performers!

It's been so hectic for me lately, at work and at home, that I just needed a break. So I went on a solo field trip yesterday to the Chicago Home and Garden Show to check out the flowers and use my camera, which hasn't been getting much use lately. It wasn't as cool as the Philly Garden Show I went to a couple years back, but there were a couple cool exhibits...I'll post more later and hopefully get my pictures up by this weekend, because I know you all love to look at pictures of flowers!

Anyway, here's a couple of my faves that I uploaded yesterday night...(click for a larger view)

Of course, to go to the show yesterday after work sacrificed a lot of my rest time, so today I'm exhausted!

As I think I might have mentioned before (maybe I didn't mention it here, I don't remember) I really LOVED the Canadian hats during the Olympics. They were just so cute, and I realized that they were a lot cuter on the girls than the guys. I checked online to see if there was any way that I could order them, but when I went on the official site I didn't see the hats there....there was other Canadian Olympic gear, but no cute hats. Of course, when I went there today they were there but I swear they weren't there several weeks ago!

Anyway, thanks to a wonderful, awesome, super-cool reader that lives out in Canada, I got a Canadian hat in the mail! I was so excited to wear it out. I've already worn it all over the house (and Dave has, too, but he just looks weird in it), but I'm almost hoping that spring waits just a couple more weeks so I could use my hat outside. Thank you so much, Canadian reader!

Also, Dave really had his eye on the Roots USA Olympic hat, though it was $30 at Target during the games. We went there last weekend and everything was 50% off, so he bought the hat for $15. So now we've got a little collection of Olympic hats, which includes the beret that I got in '02.

So here's my little hat fashion show, which also includes me eating a chocolate that was sent over to me from a ultra-awesome individual who went to Torino (sorry, I forgot to wear the pin, too!). The chocolates are delicious, but I'm limiting myself to one a day which is driving me crazy...I want to take a bunch of pics much like my "self dorktrait" from a couple years ago...

Too busy today (and yesterday) to make a post with any substance to it...

So I shall leave you with a photo that I took on the airplane on the way to Aruba...

That looks so tempting right now!

Male Bonding - February 2006

As I mentioned before, Dave doesn't really play with Ewok or know how to treat him. Usually, when I'm with Ewok on the couch, he'll be snuggled up next to me or I'll be napping and he'll hop up next to me so I can hug him like a teddy bear.

With Dave, he likes to jump up on the couch and hang out in the crook of Dave's knees as he's lying down.

But in this case, Ewok was on the couch first, but Dave didn't want to bother and move him, so he just put his legs over Ewok, who then oozed out from underneath Dave's legs and then put his chin on the footrest. The two of them settled like that, in some sort of weird man/dog harmony. I just had to take a picture!

Anyway, Ewok's gone now, and the house is a little emptier. I was so used to getting up and taking him out, or napping on the couch and having him at my feet. It was so nice to have him around! I liked the extra company!

27 weeks, 4 days and 27lbs

Just an update picture that I took at work last week, after my gorgefest in Vegas. I gained about 5lbs during that trip even through I was trying to be good. However, food is definitely my weakness so I didn't try too hard.

Fortunately, I haven't gained much weight since then, so I shouldn't get into TOO much trouble with the doc tomorrow!

Yesterday I was sitting at home with Dave, watching TV as he surfed the net. I was sipping on my homemade concoction of bananas, pineapples, strawberry ice cream and vanilla soy milk (which actually was quite tasty) and he was sipping on a bottled Mocha Frappucino.

I love Frappucinos.

However, in my current condition I was advised to stay away from caffeine. Not that it was forbidden...my doctor had actually said that one or two cups was ok. But just for the baby's sake, I've been avoiding it completely.

It's hard to avoid it when it's right in front of your face.

So in a fit of madness, I grabbed Dave's drink and chugged a bit of it down. My ears were deaf to Dave's screams of "Christine!!! The baby!!! Think of the baby!" My only thoughts were of savoring those precious gulps of coffee goodness.

Of course, in my haste, I spilled a bunch of it on myself. To which Dave said, "Ha! That's what you get!"

Later on that night, we were having pizza for dinner, which for some reason I've been LOVING lately. I was happily munching on my slice and I happened to look down on my shirt.

For some reason, it looked like a tomato exploded on my shirt. I must have dropped a sausage on myself and it probably bounced off my big belly and went all over the place.

Dave caught me looking at myself and then saw my shirt and bust out laughing. Hard. I gave him my sad face and said pitifully, "I'm a fat pregnant slob!" Dave, in between bouts of laughter, agreed, "My wife is a big slob!"

It was hilarious and sad at the same time, there I sat at the dinner table with my shirt all stained with coffee and pizza sauce, it looked like I'd never eaten before. We had a good laugh over it and then he made me go upstairs to change my shirt because he couldn't look at me without laughing.

I don't know what it is, half my food ends up on my shirt now. It could be that I'm so excited to eat that I miss my mouth, or just that my hand eye coordination has been sucking lately. But for some reason, a good percentage of my food ends up on my shirt, rather than in my mouth!

In the middle, Frappucino stains, at the bottom, pizza stains...

....unless it's picture of me dancing on a stripper pole in a party bus...

The story behind this is quite innocent. Last week we were staying at the Aladdin, but because of scheduling conflicts, had to move the second half of our meetings to a new hotel. So after the main group finished up, the little sub-group that I'm part of packed up their stuff and got ready to go to the other hotel. Since there were about 14 of us going, we needed to rent a bus to get there. The cheapest bus that they could find was one of those party buses that they use for bachelor parties and strippers (guys, don't tell me you DON'T know what that is...). What was funny was that most of the people in my group were older people who had no idea what kind of bus this was. So there was no party on the party bus.

But I decided before we left the bus to have some fun with the stripper pole, because anyone who was at my bachelorette party knows of my skillz. Of course, I didn't do too well because of my big belly, but it was still fun.

So I'm considering taking up stripping to raise money for my unborn child.

Eh, maybe not...

I've been in meetings and training for the past couple days. During one training session, the trainer gave us some pipe cleaner to keep us active and awake, which is a great idea. So of course, I spent more time concentrating on my pipe cleaner creations than the class. However, I did learn a lot. I'm great at multi tasking.

It wouldn't be the new year if I didn't post an annual cousins picture! There's a couple missing, but a majority of us were there for our first picture of the year...

23 Weeks

It's been about a month since my last picture update.

I've gotten significantly more huge since my last picture - not only my belly, but my ass as well!

I can't imagine growing any bigger - I still have four months to go! I'm huge! Call me Shamu!

However, this picture is a bit deceiving. My medium sized pregnancy pants were feeling a big snug, so I wore the large ones that Chariya had given to me when going to work (where this picture is taken). Bad idea! I was in such a hurry to leave, I didn't realize that the pants were REALLY big on me. I was pulling them up all day! So this picture isn't really representative of how big my ass is right now. Well, just a little.

Happy New Year Everyone!

I've been planning on posting this picture of my Christmas tree, but I've been too lazy to download it off my camera.

It's fun to get a real tree, all my life we'd had the same plastic tree. But Dave had always loved real trees (his family would sometimes get them). But it's so hard picking "the tree", finding a tree that's big enough, that has enough coverage, that looks even.

Last year, we had a nice tree, but when the time came to throw it away it was so prickly! Dave and I almost cried because the needles hurt so much. This year, we made sure to ask for a non-prickly tree, and we got a balsam fir. So much softer!

We've got about 3 years of ornaments that we've accumulated, most from Target and K-Mart (I never knew that nice ornaments could be so expensive!) and leftovers from his parents.

I love lights, so I went a little crazy stringing the lights on. There's a lot. We also managed to put on every single ornament we own on that tree. So the tree looks a bit busy and overcrowded. But hey, it looks good! We may try a different tactic next year, though.

Oh, and we named this tree "Christmas Ballsy". I have no idea why.

Here's a pic I stole from Melanie, it's a little out of focus, but I thought it was cute...

Anytime there's a storm and I see the sun come out, I look for a rainbow. I check out where the sun is and look the opposite way, knowing that the sunshine would cast a rainbow against the stormclouds.

I always love seeing rainbows. There's just something magical about them.

On rare occasions, you can sometimes see a double rainbow - an outside arc over the rainbow that has the colors reversed. It's normally pretty faint, but there are sometimes that it can be seen without straining. The cool thing about a double rainbow is that it has the colors reversed, it's a mirror image of the main rainbow.

So the next time you're marveling at a rainbow, check out the outer edges of it to see if there's an extra surprise!

Felt like posting a picture today...

Polar Bears - San Diego Zoo : November 2003

I love that Coke commercial, where the baby polar bear slides down the hill and finds himself among a school of penguins. Is it a school when you're talking about penguins? For some reason, it doesn't seem right. Anyway, I'm always waiting for the penguins to scream and run about in terror as the mama and papa bear come down to pick up the little one. Then again, the penguins wouldn't know to be scared of the polar bear, since they live in the south pole and polar bears are in the north pole. Which leads to the question - How did they all end up together? Are they part of some sort of weird coca cola experiment?

These are the things that go through my hormone confused mind in the middle of the night.

Thank you.

Just a quick post to show you a pic I took when I got into my hotel. My belly's getting pretty big, and based on this picture, it looks like my ass is getting pretty lumpy, too!

18 Weeks, 4 Days

Sculpture at Wizard World Chicago

I haven't posted a random picture in a while. When I was at the comic book convention a couple months ago, I saw a whole bunch of little statues that were pretty cool, this is one of them. The lighting was just perfect and I just love the pose!

Happy Halloween everyone!!!

While Dave was in Vegas last weekend doing some bible readings, knitting sweaters, scrapbooking and watching Michael Jackson impersonators for his friend's bachelor party (who am I kidding? It was a weekend full of boobies galore!) I was at my cousin Trully's house carving pumpkins with the cousins.

It is now our annual pumpkin carving night, and we had pizza, calamari, and pumpkin pie to fill our bellies while we carved out our pumpkins. For anyone that's never done it before, it's quite a workout! I don't know how anyone can expect a little kid to do it, it takes a lot of arm strength.

Our new little baby, Kenzo, dressed up in his lion costume that he wore earlier in the day at the zoo halloween fest they attended. You could tell that he wasn't happy at all to be in the stuffy costume, but he was so adorable!

Here's a couple pics from the night:

Kenzo is grouchy in his costume!

Fatima's spooky castle

Maui's Werewolf

Marlon's "Wicked" pumpkin

Melanie and Jerome's gaggle of ghouls

Trully, Claudine and Melanie's lone ghost

The howling wolf that Claudine and I made

Pumpkin guts! Eew...

When I think of where I get my quirky sense of humor, I assume it comes from my dad, who's humor is a little off the wall and he's quite a prankster. But then I see pictures like this, I realize my goofy gene comes from both sides:

I found this picture a while ago, and scanned it in because I had forgotten that she had taken it. Her humor was a little more silly than off the wall, and she loved to laugh. I wish I had that laugh on tape! Maybe I do have it somewhere on video, but it would be too painful to look for it. Give me another year, maybe I'll have the strength to.

I wish I wrote more about my mother before she passed away, or had a journal while growing up. Sometimes I sit here and realize my memories are fading - which is the reason I started this blog in the first place. It saddens me, to forget bits and pieces of my time with my mother.

It's funny when you're a teenager, and you think to yourself, "I NEVER want to be like my parents when I grow up." Looking back, I can't even remember why I thought that - maybe because I thought they were too strict, maybe because they were too stubborn or sheltered me too much. But now I realize that it made me the person that I am today, a person that I think turned out pretty ok. My parents raised three very different girls, and they all ended up being good people. I can only hope to be that lucky.

So now, I don't mind when people tell me I'm like my mom, that I look like her, or that I act like her. It makes me proud, and gives me hope that yeah, maybe I'll grow up to be amazing person she was.

Haven't posted a picture on here in a while, so...

This is a picture of Dr. Doom, me and Galactus, the Devourer of Worlds at the Chicago Comic Convention this past summer. Galactus is this all knowing, all powerful being who goes around the universe looking for worlds to consume to satisfy his hunger.

Sounds pretty intimidating, huh?

Well, intimidating until you see his cute fluffy booties:

Sure, he may eat worlds and destroy civilizations in one bite, but a guy who wear big fuschia booties like that doesn't scare me!

One of the most interesting things when you're walking down the street at Venice Beach are these signs practicing free speech, part of "The Worlds Largest Free Speech Display". You can read about a lot of them here. I didn't take much time to read them, but some of the titles were just damn funny.

Back from Aruba! I'm tired, which is strange considering I've been napping and doing nothing for the whole week in paradise...

I'm as dark as chocolate (except for my legs, which actually seem to reflect the sunlight and are still pretty pale) and I've got a ton of pictures!

More tomorrow!

Haven't done one of these in a while...

Photo Friday : Violet

Sea Anemone - Long Beach, CA : November 2003

As promised, my New York pictures. Didn't take much because I was too busy looking at everything...

Since I had figured out how to use my macro setting on my camera, I decided to go into my garden yesterday to see what I could find to take a picture of. Unfortunately, most of the flowers there are dead (is it my fault? I don't know. I think the plants are supposed to be dead around this time. Right? Please tell me they're supposed to be dead, because they are.) Well, not all the flowers are dead. There's a bush with some pretty purple flowers on it that I was going to take some close-ups of.

I found this big fat bumblebee looking for pollen, and took a couple pictures of him, though I really had to control the urge to flail around and run for cover every time it started flying around. Soon, I realized there were a bunch of bees in the bush, reveling in all the pollen that this plant produced.

After running around the backyard as I was chased by a deadly dragongly, I returned to the bush to find a monarch butterfly checking out the pollen count. It was hard to take a picture of him because he just wouldn't stay still. I would have loved to take a close-up of him, but that didn't happen.

I noticed that the flowers right next to the house were in bloom (seems like every time I come home there are new plants in bloom. The people who owned this house before us were master gardeners, I feel bad that we have no idea what we're doing) I took a couple pics of those, then came back to the big purple bush. I saw this fat bug flying around from flower to flower, then realized it wasn't a fat bug, it was a hummingbird. This little guy was a little more sensitive to my presence with the camera, so everytime I came in for a close shot, he'd move away. Next time, I should remember to camouflage myself with leaves or something. But I managed to get a good shot of him, after about 20 pictures.

[edit: After a short debate (I wasn't too sure anyway) Sam has convinced me that it wasn't a hummingbird. It was, in fact, a very fat moth. Hmph. FUCK YOU, AQUAMAN.]

[edit #2: because I cannot stand being wrong, I did some research, and found out that this thing is indeed a hummingbird - a hummingbird moth! Yeah. I'm half right.

So here are my pictures of my photoadventure. The first picture has the butterfly, bumblebee and fat moth all in one shot - can you see them? Click on the picture to see where they're hidden....

I've fallen in love with photography again, thanks to my new obsession to my Flickr account that Walter gave me. I'm not even a quarter way of posting up all the picture I have, but that dream of finally having galleries for my photos is coming true. It's easier to post up my higher quality photos up here than what I've been doing.

So the other day, bored in my hotel, I finally figured out how to use the supermacro lens on my camera. I absolutely love this picture that I took, of my favorite shade of lipstick. Click on the picture for more detail...

Since I've been really bored here in my trashy hotel in Jackson, I decided to have a photoshoot with myself to show of my new hairdo. Ten minutes and about 50 pictures later, I've found three that I don't look completely dorky in. Not that I don't look dorky in these...

I am lovin' this new cut. It's got a lot more layers, but these are healthy layers, compared to the hacked off layers I had done when I was in California. If I put it up in a bun when it's wet and take it down around midday I get a nice amount of body and waves. These pics were taken at the end of the day, and it's still bouncy and happy.

Jack Hayes at Studio 8, you are my hero.

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