This morning, Little and I sneaked into our bedroom to ask if Bryce was ready to get up or not and found a few bright blue earplugs (life savers for him when sharing a room with Little) strewn about the room. I vaguely wondered at this as we pussy-footed through the room, but when we got to the bed my curiosity was piqued. Sitting next to Bryce on the bed was an ear plug that looked as though it had been eaten by either a dog, or a very thorough rodent, and short of said dog shimmying silently through the second floor window and back out again, there was no way to get into the room, thus creating the mystery. I picked it up and looked at it for a minute before Bryce said in his groggy half awake voice, "I ate my earplug."

Being married to Bryce has made me very aware that there are so many simple things I take for granted. The latest? Depth perception. Normally Bryce functions just like everyone, but sometimes he'll do something odd, or make a comment that makes me realize just how many adjustments he has to make for his absent eye.

Little man has had an exceptionally difficult time sleeping lately, for the last few months really. He usually wakes up around 2:00am or 3:00am, sometimes screaming/flailing, sometimes crying, sometimes happy as a lark and singing to himself. He then stays up for an hour or two and battles it out with me as to whether or not he will actually go back to bed. Translation: both Little and I are borderline crazy sleep deprived lunatics these days. We've tried everything under the sun, so any suggestions on how to remedy this would be much appreciated. 
We went up to my sister's house tonight to visit them and my mom (who is visiting for a while, hooray!) and help get their house ready for the realtor, so we were running around all day. We were dying of tired to begin with so apparently a busy day did my poor little monster in. When we finally called a cease-fire on the Windex and hung up our mops, I was challenged to a round of Guitar Hero. So fun. Loud, banging, rock-songs-full-blast fun. In the midst of this--after dancing like crazy--Little found his way to the floor right in front of the drum set and to the calming sounds of Aerosmith was lulled to sleep. He slept on for about an hour while we (no less noisily) kept rocking out.

Two things I think are worthy of note: One, Bryce and I had a shadow fight the other day. Mostly our shadows were strangely huge on the wall and suddenly it occurred to me that my shadow could perfectly karate chop his... so the fight began. I think Bryce's shadow won.
Two, in helping get Bryce ready for all his interviews I've been asking him all the probing questions and what not. He's had some pretty good answers for most of them, but oddly enough the one that stumped him was "Tell me about a time when you failed at something." It took my dear husband three full days to think of an answer (and even then it was a lame one). Am I wrong that most people can think of at least three possibly more like 300 times they have failed right off the top of their heads? I certainly can. Welcome to life with Bryce.  

Or how God shows his love through chigger babies

So... we're back. And hopefully that means back to blogging. I make no promises, but I will do my best to make sure it isn't a month before the next post. Not that I have anything terribly relevant to say other than "we're back," but since when has that stopped me from blogging, eh? 
So for lack of something better to share, let me share the oh-so-fantastic surprise we found upon our return (and yes... that is indeed a seemingly unimportant and utterly pointless cane hanging in the tree outside of our apartment).
To explain the joy of this we have to go back about a year to a Halloween party. We bought aforementioned cane to complete Bryce's costume, but afterwards couldn't quite figure out what to do with it. It floated around from place to place in the house, and even down to the storage unit a few times, but in a moment of purging, it was finally decided that we no longer needed to keep it around it for our not-so-geriatric selves and I told Bryce that he could go ahead and throw it away. We went about our business, cane-less and perfectly fine with that until a few days later when I looked up at the tree outside of our apartment, and there it was... our very own cane hanging from the branches. Bryce had apparently been waiting for me to discover it. I got a good laugh and left it there until I could go out and return it to the dumpster the next day. However, upon waking up the next day I found that it had moved. It was still in the tree, but in a different location. And thus it has been every morning since. Every now and again we'd see the neighbor kids playing with it or see it on the ground around the yard, but always it ends up back in our tree. I said my final goodbye to it as we headed out for the summer (I didn't really, but we did have a conversation about the slim chances of it being there when we got home) and then I promptly forgot all about it. That is until we pulled into the apartment at 2:00 am and saw it sitting in our tree, a little worse for wear, but still welcoming us home. Melodramatic, I know. However, the impressive part of the tale is that we had a storm to beat all storms the other night--lightning, hail, trees blowing over, etc. When we woke up in the morning, outside of our apartment was a disaster. There were tree branches everywhere and all sorts of craziness, but there sat our cane, like it hadn't noticed a thing in the night. We've decided it's a land mark. 
So there you have it, a needlessly long story simply to say that I'm glad to be home and I think I might really miss it if my poor little weather beaten cane were to one day disappear.

We ended up taking a trip up to visit my sister for the 4th of July and had a blast. Other than Little having a rough time both to and from (apparently we're prone to carsickness in motorhomes), there was plenty of fun to be had by all. Here is the highlight reel:

It is Father's Day in two days and I am officially the worst present giver in the world. In my defense, Bryce is the worst present receiver in the world (for various reasons that would take far too long to discuss in this post), but all the same, he will not have one present to open on Father's day. Here is my problem: I ponder and ponder for months in advance until I find the perfect gift for the person, I purchase it right away (usually still months in advance), then get excited--full to the brim with the thought of giving my perfect gift and what joys it will bring, then I spill over and somehow (whether intentionally or no) spill the beans to the person, then I have to repeat the process all over again so that they will have an actual gift on the date. Why don't I just write a card as a reminder of said gift? you ask... because a gift isn't a good gift if you already know all about it. So say I. However, for this Father's Day, I was going to be smart. I decided to wait until the last minute to get the gift so I wouldn't give it away. And now I sit, the day before Father's Day-eve and his gift is still in transit. Curse my gift giving tendencies! Good thing Bryce knows we love him anyway.

Two things...

A toy in the closet, cracker in the couch, a flip flop in the bottom of the stroller, and recently we've added actual Easter eggs to the list making it a bit more excusable, but still... We've officially decided that our life is one all-encompassing Easter egg hunt. Things are hiding everywhere. In one way it's an adventure a because life is full of little discoveries, on the other hand, half the time you can't find anything because Little has taken it to one of his hiding places and you end up tearing apart the house in an effort to find it again. The latter view tends to take over my mentality. Good thing he is so cute. 

 So Little has a fisher price pirate ship set that has pretty much been his sole entertainment since my sister gave it to him a month or so ago. He particularly dotes on the cannonball. He carries it around everywhere he goes which means that at any given moment you could find yourself sitting on, kicking, dislodging, or being otherwise accosted by a cannonball in our house.This morning it was on the kitchen table for some reason and as Bryce moved to do something it somehow flew off and hit him in the gut. He caught it and immediately yelled out, "We're under SIEGE!!!" looking around frantically. Few times in my life have I laughed that hard. 
 Also... I was remiss in blogging his actual birthday so I thought I'd add some more piracy to this post. Of course it was a pirate birthday. I'm not sure that you can read it in the picture, but we made him a shirt that says, "Yo, ho, ho, and a bottle of milk" and my sister's kids outfitted him with a pirate hat so that he could be truly piratical for the day. I made a treasure island cake and we played find the treasure on the map and tattooed ourselves silly. Much to our surprise, Little ate the cake pretty daintily and barely got a touch on himself, which was terribly unpiratical, but we'll work on that later.

Not that I ever had any grand illusions about this, but I can't spell. This is a recent rather disheartening discovery. If we're being honest, I can't say it's entirely recent as I've been attempting to find comfort in blaming my deteriorating mental state on motherhood for quite some time now--and yes, there has been a serious decline in brain functionality since Little's been around; however, apparently my problems are much deeper. I hit a new low when, while walking in the baby clothing section, I had an epiphany (as much as I wish it weren't the case, the amount of awe and shock I felt can only be classified that way). There is a word, not a very common word, but one everyone knows (read: should have known how to spell from the third grade). A word seldom seen in print, but simple enough to be placed on a baby's t-shirt. A word that has caused me to question my existence as a college graduate. A word that I am way too embarrassed to actually mention. I took one look at that little baby shirt with aforementioned word printed on it and realized that my entire life I've been spelling it wrong, and not just wrong, egregiously so. It starts with a completely different letter for heavens sake! Now, I recognize that this post is ridiculously over-dramatic, but there really is no doing justice to the trauma I felt when faced with the staggering reality of my mental state. Ok. Dramatics done. Simply put: I would lose horribly if I ever played "Are You Smarter Than A 5th Grader?" and I find myself wondering how on earth I expect to write a book (or even a coherent sentence) in my current state. 

We've been doing some serious spring cleaning. And by "we," I really mean I semi-conned Bryce into staying up until all hours of the night rearranging and cleaning out for days on end. He did get a new desk out of it, not to mention a much better feeling house, but all the same... For him it ended up being less of a "Hooray! Spring break!" and more of a  "Spring break... now get to work!" Being the fantastic husband he is, he never complained and we got everything cleaned, rearranged, and bought a few little things to spruce up the apartment. It's amazing what a few new pillows can do for the sanity. Anyway... the point is that this spring cleaning extravaganza has made me realize just how much junk I haul around with us. Bryce and I have the same conversation every move (and plenty of times between moves):
     Bryce: "Hey, lets get rid of everything we own when we have to move again and just get all new stuff." (When we actually have a job of course)
     Me: "But that'd be so expensive!"
     Bryce: (insert some reminder about the cost of moving and storage)
     Me: "But...but...but..."
and so forth and so on. I always win of course, but not because I have any sort of logical reason to keep any of it. I mean, yes the furniture works, but none of it fits together in the least. Yes, the kitchen stuff is limping along, but most of it is really worn out and crappy. Yes, the bookshelves are great for storage, but what bookshelf isn't? I don't have any excuse for most of the stuff in the basement storage, so that I win on pure sentimentality--which would be fine if it was all pictures and love notes, but most of it is extra kitchen stuff and decorations, or that thing that I keep saying "someday I'll use" but never have yet. I realized the other day that with every move, and every thought of moving, Bryce wins me over to his side by doing nary a thing; he just sits back and lets logic slowly seep into my brain (which is far more difficult than it should be).
My conclusion: the sentimentality/usefulness of a thing is directly proportional to a: the distance it has to be moved, and b: the amount of times it has to be moved. 
Also... Dear Spring, I'm so glad you are here again. Oh! How I've missed you!

I officially have a one year old today. Crazy! If you would have told me a year ago when I was completely miserably in labor that I would barely even remember it now, I would've called the loony bin on you, but I really don't. I can tell you how many hours I was there and how much I hate pitocin, but only because I remember thinking that at the time, not because I remember feeling it or being uncomfortable in the slightest. So strange. From the second they put him into my arms the world started changing and even on my worst days knowing that I have my amazing little man makes things not so terrible.
We didn't do much for him today (other that Bryce sharing his ice cream sandwich which made Little happier than I've ever seen him); we're postponing birthday shenanigans partially because we are all sick and partially because we are headed up to my sister's on Saturday for a real celebration (pirates included of course). Holidays are going to get a lot more complicated when he actually starts understanding how dates work. 
Anyway... Little has been in the happiest of happy moods lately, bordering on cloud 9 constantly if not there. He squeals and giggles himself to sleep, shouts at me ecstatically all day long, is always laughing at his own private jokes and/or me (which is great for the self-esteem), and is pretty consistently being a goof ball in some way or other. We are loving it. Truth be told he's normally a happy little camper, but lately he's been taking it to a whole new level. 

http://failblog.org/2011/02/07/epic-fail-photos-oddly-specific-the-big-squirrel-face-off/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+failblog+(The+FAIL+Blog+-+Fail+Pictures+%26+Videos+at+Failblog.ORG)

So... we just got back from a week of vacation. A glorious family-filled, don't-manage-to-get-dressed-until-noon-most-days vacation. Bryce was studying away and had a big paper do so me and Little hightailed it to visit the family. Hooray! So we spent a week and a half surrounded by family and friends and doing whatever on earth we wanted to do. 

1. How to strike fear into the heart of your younger cousins (and sometimes the older ones too) 

3. Grandmas, aunts/uncles, and cousins are the best (all the way home he was crying for "ba-ba" aka: Jack Jack and mmmm-ma aka: grandma)

5. Hugs often mean strangulation and/or getting an eye poked out for both parties, but that doesn't seem to matter much                                              6. What real snow looks like (thanks to the huge storm that blew right in and out again while we were there)

7. How to be a concert pianist (he takes his music very seriously)                                                                     8. Who needs toys when you have water bottles and spoons? Leaving me to question: Why on earth did I pack all those toys and what nots?

Confession. 
My birthday has always been a deep dark secret. I avoid thinking about it at all cost, steer clear of anyone familiar on the day of, go to unimaginable lengths to keep it hidden, etc. But here is my confession: today is my birthday. And I don't even care who knows it. I think I'm growing up.


Also, my aunt got this form me when I was about 7 years old: http://www.captainzoom.com/personalized-birthday-music-CD.html I made Bryce listen to it this morning and discovered that not only do they still make it, they have wedding, anniversary, and Christmas versions as well. Hooray! One guess what Bryce is getting for our anniversary this year. 

Sometimes I sing. Sometimes I sing at the top of my lungs. Sometimes I sing at the top of my lungs to 80's rock ballads. Sometimes I sing at the top of my lungs to 80's rock ballads and forget that the window is open and all my neighbors--who already think I'm a nut--can hear until my husband comes home and informs me that he could hear me two parking lots away... literally. Sometimes I feel sheepish. 
The only good part in all of this is that I've never seen Little laugh so hard. 

We went to church yesterday and there was a little girl--probably around 9 years old--with the cutest boots on. The sad part of this story? I own the exact boots. Not similar boots, or the adult version of the boots... the exact boots. Probably the same size too if we're being strictly honest. Bryce and I were laughing every time we saw her. 

This just in: I will never ever have time to write again in my life. There is just way too much going on in life and that looks to be the case for at least the next 50 years. Thus I have decided that I am going make time. As much as I wish this meant I could open a few cans from the storage cupboard and whip up a good batch of time to use whenever I run out, it doesn't. This essentially means that I have proclaimed one day a week project day. Wherein I work on whatever projects have been sitting around waiting to be done because there is always and will always be something more pressing and/or requiring immediate and all encompassing attention.

We decided the other day that it was about time to do away with the binky. Not that we think Little is too old or that a pacifier is a terrible thing or anything; it just seemed like it was time. He doesn't really need it anymore and the only time he ever wants it is nap time, so... out with the binky. 
I thought this was going to be a horrid process of weeping, and wailing, and gnashing of what few teeth we have. As it turns out, no. It is not. I put him to bed last night sans binky and he did his usual thing--a few moments of whining that turns to growling that turns to half hearted grunting that turns to sleep. Not a peep about the absent binky. That has been the trend all day today as well. In fact for his afternoon nap he laughed himself to sleep. Fantastic. I have a sneaking suspicion that I have the best baby in the world.
Also, speaking of said adorable little man...