Picky Eater

Some say the best way to a man's heart is through his stomach. I say the best way to get a little man to eat his vegetables is with M&Ms.





Most of you know that I was once a ridiculously picky eater [Yeah, Yeah, I'm still pretty picky too]. Well, my son has inherited the gene from his mommy dearest. We're still feeding him baby food vegetables just to get them in him, and lately it has become a real chore to get him to eat those veggies. He has issues with textures. What can I say? I did too. I still do. But, I've got to get them in him somehow.

I've found that if I wave one M&M in front of him and let him know that if he eats half of his veggies he gets the M&M. Works like a charm. I even offered a second M&M if he finished them. In the end, I had a happy little man full of squash and two delicious M&Ms!

Project

It was a little over a week ago when I completed this project, and I told my mom I would post some pictures. I've been a little busy since Tom's been doing alot of traveling, so I'm just getting around to it.

My project was making a window seat cusion for the kitchen nook.

Here are the supplies I used.


I started by getting Tom to cut two pieces of plywood 4'x 13" each to fit inside the seat shelf. I used this as the base of each cusion.




Second, I traced the wood pieces onto the 3" thick foam.




After tracing the wood on the foam, I used an electric meat cutter to cut the foam.

Next, I measured the fabric and cut it to wrap around the foam and wood. Then, I used the staple gun to attach the fabric.



And, Ta Da.



Sweet Pea sure is glad I finally completed this project.



Here's a sneak peek at the fabric for the window treatments. I'm not sure what I want yet. Hmmmm....


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The count down is on. Only 2 more days until the pool opens! Wahoo!

Grandpa Deen Visit

Last Friday Tom flew to Illinois to visit with his dad, brother, and grandma. Then on Saturday he drove with his dad all the way down to our house in Texas. Micah was excited to see his Grandpa Deen.

Grandpa Deen didn't come to Texas empty handed. In fact, he hauled a trailor with all kinds of goodies including these:





The fishing boat was Tom's Grandpa Sawyer's boat. Since the motor hasn't been in use in over a decade, we're hoping it still has some life left in it. We need to take it to someone to check everything out. I'll keep you posted.

The rocking horse was Tom's when he was Micah's age. His Grandpa [Hessie] Deen built it for him. Micah hopped on and rode away as if he'd been doing it for years. It's now his favorite place to sit and watch tv.








Also over the weekend, I started a flower bed around the oak tree in the backyard.

...But not in my cookie

Not only did we run in the bluebonnets Friday, but we also spent some time on the playground.


My little boy is getting so big.






He's also mastered the climbing wall all by himself.


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I have a question for all of the mother's out there. My son will gobble down a box of raisins. For several weeks it was hard to keep cinnamon raisin bread in the house without the munchkin eating it all. So, one day I decided to make a special treat for him, oatmeal raisin cookies. Someone please tell me why he'll eat the entire cookie and spit out all of the raisins. Ugh.

Bluebonnets

For the last several days I've noticed cars parked on the side of the road at a rather old cemetary I pass on a daily basis. I finally started to look a little closer as I drove by, and I noticed that there were people out there taking photos in the wild flowers. There are bluebonnets everywhere. So, Friday I followed suit and decided to stop with Tom and Micah to take some photos of them running around in the wild flowers. I even broke out my 35mm SLR that I haven't used in several months. There was a roll half exposed in my camera when I picked it up off of the shelf. I haven't gotten those rolls developed yet, and I'm extremely curious what's on that half exposed roll. I'll try to remember to drop those off while I'm running errands this week.

Here are some of the photos I took with my digital point-and-shoot camera.

















And today I received an e-mail from Chris, my brother-in-law, containing this photo warning about the snakes in Texas...EEEEEEEEK! I'm glad he sent that e-mail today or else I never would have stepped foot out there.

Recess

...I got creative during outside recess. Too bad you can see my shadow in the picture.


Sorry, there are alot of shadows in these photos.

Micah wanted to say "Thank You" to the Clarks for the golf set. He's had lots of fun with it.

Words

At 19 1/2 months old, Micah is up to 15 words. At least that's as many as I can remember him saying frequently. Sure, he mimics words we say all the time, but he tends to use these 15 words in the correct context and communicates with us when he uses them.

1. Mama
2. Dada
3. No No
4. Dog
5. Down
6. Uh oh
7. Oh no
8. Hot
9. Ball
10. Hello (sounds more like "low")
11. Nana
12. Booger
13. Cookie
14. Hi
15. Bye Bye

Here's a sample of him speaking. He's so absorbed in his toys these days which makes it hard to get him to face the camera. This is the best I could get.

Easter and Current Events

The Easter Bunny left all these goodies for Micah


...And here's Micah's reaction




We tried getting everyone looking and smiling at the same time, but it's harder than it looks or seems.






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This weekend flew by just like the last few. Friday I cleaned and cleaned and cleaned. Tom had agreed to keep Micah all day Saturday so I could get out of the house for the ENTIRE day! (something that hadn't happened since we moved) I started out my morning at Starbucks and a massage at Massage-Space, and then I was off to the movies to see The Last Song. Other than technical difficulties which resulted in free movie passes and popcorn and drinks, I thought the movie was pretty good. It's a chick flick. It doesn't take much to entertain me. After the movie I did some power shopping. I shopped the mall that the theater was in, stores around the perimeter of the mall, and then I went over to Allen to the Outlet Mall. I finally stopped shopping around 8:30pm. I was pooped, but I came home with all kinds of goodies. I could use more days like that!

Today Tom stuck around for church and just long enough to cut the grass before he left for the airport again. This time he's spending the next 4 days in New Orleans for the AAPG meeting. Micah and I sure do miss him these days. Hopefully, after next week's trip to Houston he'll be home for a little while.

Easter Eve

Now that I'm starting to feel a little better, I'll finish up this blog about Easter weekend. The pollen really got to me at the beginning of the week, and Tom has been in Houston for the last couple days leaving me busy with the little man all to myself.

Saturday morning we got one last stab at hunting eggs for this Easter season. Our neighborhood was holding an egg hunt for the little ones. There was even an age group for Hannah and Chase. And on top of it all, they stuffed the eggs with the good candy--Reeces! (they were slightly melted, but that's nothing the freezer couldn't fix)

My brother's family before the hunt


My parent's with us before the hunt



Micah found a grand total of 4 eggs before the whole playground was swept clean.


I snuck a couple of his eggs out of his basket and let him find them again...


...And after the hunt we played








To be continued...I thought I could finish this, but Private Practice is on. It's a re-run, but a re-run I haven't seen yet.

The Honeycutts Visit Texas

For Easter weekend we had more visitors. This time my parents and my brother's family made the trip to see us. When my parents arrived Friday afternoon, they had a surprise for Tom.



Oh, boy, was Tom thrilled. Tom and my dad took it out to the backyard immediately to test it out on a stump that was about 4ft tall. While it was Tom's first time to use a chainsaw, my dad stood behind him mimicking how he moved it back and forth like a manual saw. The rest of the family stood at the back door and back windows laughing. Tom didn't seem to notice anything going on around him. He was way too excited to know that he had his very own chain saw. Finally, my dad told him that the extra motion was unnecessary.

(BTW, we don't recommend wearing flip flops while using a chainsaw. No injuries were noted, but I just wanted to throw that out there.)

Micah was happy to see Grandaddy again and to ride on his knee.


Friday night we spent some time out by the fire making s'mores and sharing stories.









The rest of the weekend was pretty action packed as well, but I'll save it for my next entry. I'm going to go be a couch potato with Tom for the rest of the evening.