I heart yard sales

FINALLY Ian and I were able to make it to some yard sales this morning. It is NOT Ian's favorite thing to do on a Saturday morning, but he is a good sport about it! I don't like going alone, it makes me nervous walking up to strangers homes!

Anyway, we did pretty good today. We basically just go to look for baby things now. We weren't very successful until we went to a sale that was being put on by Edge Cheer Center. There were BINS of little boy baby clothes for .50 a piece. Jackpot! I bought 14 shirts/pants/shorts. I also bought 6 books for Eli for $1. Then there was a cool toy there--a friend we ran into at the sale said that she had the same toy and it was $30 at Walmart, and we got it for $5!! He loves it.

Fish face!!

Eli's newest "trick"--

Eli eats from a spoon again!

After a 2 week break, Eli took food from a spoon tonight!! YAYYYY! I actually mixed some apple sauce with it, he seemed to like that a bit better. Check out this silly boy!!

Click here to view this video

raspberries

I'm terribly sorry that I have neglected my avid readers! I have hardly sat down in the past couple of days! I was just joking about the whole "single mom" thing, but now I'm serious!! Although we sleep in the same bed every night, we haven't had a real conversation in quite awhile. I'll head out to the race tomorrow, a friend is going to watch Eli for the day.

Things are going great with the new sitter, Cheryl. She is sooooo sweet and nice. She loves Eli a lot, too. Every day when I pick him up she tells me what a good baby she is and how lucky she is to watch him. She accidentally started calling herself "grandma" to him but I told her I didn't mind! Hope his real grandmas don't mind either. He's always in a very good mood when I pick him up, too, which definitely says something!

Today Eli and I took a walk around the neighborhood. I wanted to use the stroller in the normal way where he faces forward, not by connecting the car seat to the stroller like usual-Just so he could look at what was in front of him. It worked great! The only problem was the sun. I was afraid he would get burnt, and he definitely does not like the sun in his eyes! Here are some pictures that I took, after the walk. Don't worry I strapped him in when we were actually walking!! Sorry I overdid it, I couldn't pick just one!! The expressions are priceless.

You'll notice that Eli's chin appears to be shiny in every picture--he is drooling excessively from the teething. He's having such a rough time!! I was in tears the other night because he was just in so much pain...hopefully those teeth come through soon!

Eli's new favorite "trick" is blowing raspberries. For awhile now I have been doing it to him, because it makes him laugh so much. Now he does it too!!

Jaycees

Hey, so Laura asked me to write a short post about what the Jaycees are, and why this week she is a "single Mom!"

If you don't know already, Sebring is known for the 12-Hours of Sebring which is a 12-hour endurance grand prix race. Each year since I have been here, I have been, and of course carted Laura down once she came to live here. Once we started to get to know people we found a neat little way to pay for our somewhat expensive 4-day ticket--volunteer 4-hours of our time! Yay!! So that began our time working with the Avon Park Jaycees.

Anyway, last year I actually became the 2009, and now 2010 club president, and also signed up to run the event that makes about 95% of our budget. We give money to all sorts of projects in the county, the largest being the city fireworks--actually we run them.

This week I am off school for Tuesday-Friday, and I practically live out of the Commander, and work about 100 hours... In fact, today I worked at the track for 6, and probably an additional 6 here at the house.

For a little snapshot of what I have to do... Coordinate and round up 230 volunteers; train them all how to market, sell & serve a premium-brand liquor (Patron); secure insurance & temporary liquor licence; work with vendors like the liquor distributor & Sysco for the other products amongst 500 other things!

So wish me luck, and that we make lots of money for the club so we can make the biggest impact in the community for 2010!

Ian

Open mouth, insert foot!

I'm sitting here laughing to myself right now as Eli is sitting next to me with his toes in his mouth! It's his new thing and it's cute as ever! Is it weird that all these new things throw me into a world of excitement? Hey, anything that entertains him while I'm changing his diaper is great--if he's not entertained he tries to roll over, and let me tell you that makes it quite difficult to change him!!

Eli STILL won't eat his rice cereal with a spoon. I prepare it and try it every night, though, just in case he changes his mind. He sleeps through the night now. I give him his cereal in a bottle. Somewhere I heard that's not the right way to do it, but, you know what? I'm pretty sure it's not going to affect him in the long run!!

We start with our new sitter tomorrow! Erica was wonderful with Eli, but certain circumstances made it so she had to get a full time job. On Monday, I was talking to the head nurse, Tessa, for some of the schools in the district who had a baby girl 2 months before I had Eli. She was telling me that her mom watches her daughter at Tessa's house....and that she was looking for another baby to watch. The next day Erica told me she got a job. It made me think about that line from Sound of Music--Where God closes a door he always opens a window--that's not a direct quote but you get the picture :) I went and met Cheryl on Friday afternoon and I'm really excited about her! She's really sweet, and I can tell she likes Eli already!

This week is the 12-hours of Sebring race. We've been going to it every year since I've moved here and it's really fun. Ian and I are a member of the Avon Park Junior Chamber of Commerce, (Actually Ian is the president.) I'm passing it over to him to explain:

Food battles!

So in the last couple of days, Eli has decided that he doesn't want to eat rice cereal, afterall. Last night he screamed bloody murder after the first bite I put in his mouth. Tonight he did a little better, but decided that he was going to squirt the food out of his mouth, then rub it all over his face and arms, then proceed to try to suck it off. I promise, I know how to feed a baby, I just need to tie his hands behind his back!!

In other news, Eli has found his feet!! It's so cute that he JUST NOW realized that he can grab his toes and play with them :) Sorry about the bad-quality pictures!! Don't forget to watch

the video!!