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Thanksgiving and other stuff.....

Its been awhile since I posted, there is so much to write so I guess I will use a version of Beth's famous lists:

1. The Big Move

we moved into our house the weekend before thanksgiving. It was a huge project but we got most of it done. most of our stuff thay we dont use on a regular basis are still in boxes and probably will stay that way for several more weeks, unleast until my christmas vacation. we got a new fridge which i love. stainless french door fridge with a double door freezer on the bottom. its awesome. now we only need to remodel the rest of the kitchen to match...hahaha, yeah, that just might be in the budget somewhere in the next 5 years if we're lucky. we got a new washer and dryer. we needed a set so on black friday we were in line at sears at 4:30 am. i have NEVER gone out on black friday ever. i dont deal with those kinds of crowds well but they had a kenmore set for $599. it was necessary and wasnt that bad and while we were out we went to a few other stores. i will post pics of the house with our stuff in it soon..

2. Rhode Island

This past weekend EJ and I went to RI. we left thursday afternoona dn got back sunday night. The main reason forme flying up was to see my grandfather. He isnt doing so well and I really wanted the chance to see him. I wont be going home over the holidays due to financial reasons and santa will only deliver toys at home.....we will probably venture to RI during my christmas vacation at times just not over the actual holiday. So on saturday before my dad's concert I went to see him. My dad wasnt sure if he'd even remember me but as soon as he saw me he smiled and then started to cry. we sat and talked for awhile. he asked how the baby was and how teaching was and I just really enjoyed the time I was able to spend there. I only wish I couldve stayed longer or had the chance to go more often.

the rest of the weekend was nice. my mom and ray and me and the baby went to Edaville railroad (for those of you in miami its kind of a very small scale Santas enchanted forest but with a huge rail car that takes you around to look at the lights and stuff...and a lot colder) it was nice but cold. EJ seemed to enjoy the railway for about 10 minutes until he got bored and wanted to run around. i took him on the dumbo ride and the carosel. both were fun once the ride actually started. he screamed and fought while we were waiting for the ride to start, he is extremely impatient, but had fun once it started.

we also visited with my dad and dana which was fun. EJ ran around outside playing with sticks and leaves and had a great time.

>

i dont want to talk about the plane ride to RI. EJ was THAT CHILD on the plane. the one where you are secretly screaming inside your head "OH MY GOD, JUST GIVE HIM WHATEVER HE WANTS" yeah, loads of fun.

the ride home to Miami was much better. not perfect but better. let me just say that i will never fly with him again without his own seat and a car seat to keep him strapped down. we got a row all to ourselves (yay) and he slept for about 90 minutes (double yay) and played most of the rest of the flight (triple yay). heres a picture of him before take off on the way home.

3. Thanksgiving

out of order i know but we had thanksgiving at the new house. i found out the thursday before. lots of time to plan. it was just us and my in-laws. I made the traditional american thanksgiving dinner, my in laws had never had it. (when ive gone there we've had turkeywith cuban spices and rice and beans) so i made turkey with stuffing (real stuffing not stove top....even i was impressed with myself on that one), mashed potato, yams, green bean casserole loaded with cheese, rolls, cranberry sauce (from a can, i hate homemade). it all can out fabulous and my in-laws loved it. my father in law who hates turkey had 3 or 4 helpings along with everything else. it was great.

4. there are a few other things i wantedx to write but i'm exhausted and its time for bed. :)

We have a house! yay!

We closed on a house today...yay! its a 3 bedroom 2 bath 2002 sq ft house with a 1 car garage and a huge screened in patio on the back. It has a huge living room (with one wall of mirror stripes...yeah, they HAVE to go) a dining room, a big kitchen and even though the kitchen is no9t the prettiest kitchen ever, its deal-able until we have money to remodel it. and it also has another room off the back of the kitchen that could be the tv room if we wanted a formal living room or an office if we had two kids but for now it will probably be the playroom.....or at least where we store most of the toys. The first picture is the front of the house...off the right is the garage. there are two huge windows in the front that look into the dining room and living room. the other window on the front left is one of the three bedrooms. here is the living room and one of the sliding glass doors that lead out to the patio. off to the right is the dining room and the door leads to the kitchen.

here is the room off the kitchen (it has another sliding glass door to the patio)

and a crappy shot of the master bedroom. the little doorway leads to a hall of closets and off to the master bath.

needless to say we are so very excited and hope to move ina few weeks. :)

We LOVE bathtime!

We love bathtime. So much so that we can undress him in his room and then he proceeds to run to our bathroom and climb in the tub.....so far no accidents on the way....so far....

Halloween

So the pictures uploaded in backwards order...oh well. The last picture was the begining of the night, screaming and crying but eventually he got over it! we walked from our condo to the miramar towm center where they had tables set up for the kids to trick or treat at (althought the lines for that were really long and he doesnt eat candy anyways so we avoided that) Mostly he ran around and showed off his cute costume and played with some of the other kids. We didnt stay long, it was already past his bedtime and he was getting sleepy....so here are the pictures.

The Little Farm

We went to The Little Farm in South Miami Dade County this past Sunday. As my friend Lindsay says, it's about as "fall" as you can get around here. He got to ride apony for the first time and LOVED it. He started screaming when I took him off....

We tried to desperately to get the ever popular pumpkin picture with little luck....at first i think he was scared of the pumpkins, not wanting to touch them
but after walking around some more and trying again he seemed to be okay.

We also got to go in the petting zoo..he chased the ducks around pointing at them and then we tried to play with the little piglets but they were uninterested.

Later that night we went to E's cousins house for dinner and EJ ran around the patio and decided to "eat" the pavement. he fell face first and got huge bloody and swollen lips..top and bottom. It was increadibly cute to see him all puffy once the crying stopped! We took a bath when we got home and here are a few "after" shots of his big boo-boo.

And the last picture is what he looks like when the devil horms sprout.....we see this many many nights before bedtime....its way cuter on the picture than in person! :)

Mullet reading baby

so it occured to me after looking at a few pictures i took the other day that my child, especially in photos, looks like he has a mullet. he is a true cracker :) i am so proud. he also reads, or thinks he does.

what does this look like to you?

Art class? no. religion class? no. it is in fact my math class. both senior and freshman classes were cutting and pasteing and glueing and tracing. a weeks worth of arts and crafts did in fact yeild a math project.

Seniors: created a stained glass window by drawing lines and then gave me the equations of the lines. and made a pretty window :)

Freshman: same idea but in the form of a Mondrian art piece (you know...the guy who painted black horizontal and vertical lines and colored in the rectangles either white, blue, red or yellow). they collaged different pieces of red yellow and blue.

all in all a nice project, gave them a break, gave me a break (sort of) and let them do something out of the oridinary for math

Fraggle Rock

Fraggle Rock:

I think was one of my favorite shows EVER. The complete series will be coming out in a box set November 4.....i HAVE to have it. HAVE TO!!!! I am not sure what made me look it up online tonight but I am so excited the series is going to be released as a box set collectors set....$125 for all the episodes ever made....YAY!

ok, so does this mean i am a complete dork?

A few pictures

My house has been transformed into a mini-daycare. we have boatloads of toys (very few of which WE have actually bought) and he only plays with a few....hopefully he'll learn to like the rest eventually, because i dont think we'll be buying any new toys for a very long time! He's walking all over the house and now trying to climb on everythiing, including the big red wagon that holds all of his mega bloks...

E left for california this morning for 2 weeks..yay....(that was sarcasm). and when he does get back there are a few more trips that are possible...each at a week long....yay again.

The debate

I dont generally write about politics however today seems like a fitting time, and plus, i have a nifty link for you to follow below. Or maybe thats the main thing. Sara says it best, i think i agree with her 100% on everything. The debate was surprisingly not the circus it couldve been and while Palin was coached non-stop since the Couric interview I'm sure........she did'nt really screw up. Of course when you say the same 4 or 5 scripted phrases over and over again and repeatedly bring the conversation back to energy which is the only topic she actually knows anythign about it's kind of hard to screw it up. But Biden didnt fall apart either and considering he's not the best speaker on his feet he did ok....and there were plenty of times he couldve lashed out at Palin or corrected her but he was smart, he didnt give anyone a reason to classify him as talking down to her becasue she's a woman..etc...etc. So over all it was ok. She danced around the issues as always making it appear that she knew what she was talking about and Biden didn't say anything unexpected. Although if i have to hear Palin say the work "maverick" again I might just run screaming from the room.......or that he suggested 2 years ago that franny and freddie should have tighter restrictions on them.....thats great, but please, cant you think of just ONE other way in which mccain was a Maverick in the financial system....but whatever. I would cut and pasted sara's entire blog entry from the last 2 days but most of you know how to find it (or actually read it on a regular basis)...basically everything she said I agree. and I am scared and disheartened too as to what may happen next month...next year....etc.

but here's the fun link, i enjoyed it anyways

Sarah Palin Debate Flow Chart

Playing at the park....

Yesterday we took EJ to CB Smith Park for a bit so he could burn off some energy. The playground isnt that great but its less than a mile from our house and it was between morning and afternoon nap time so it didnt leave us much time. He ran around and played in the dirt. He seemed to enjoy that much more than actually climbing on the toys. He picked up every thing he shouldnt like straws, cup tops, plastic bags so he kept us busy chasing him around to take them away. He liked digging his hands in the sand and ended covered in dirt and all sweaty but he has fun and slept well after lunch when we got home.

We figuredout he loves sandwiches, PB&J and grilled cheese work well. he eats the whole sandwhich. so thats progress. although cutting them up into amillion little pieces is a pain it works. He likes to put the whole piece in his mouth no matter the size so we'll be cutting it up for awhile. but he eats it so thats good. hopefully he'll move on to something a little more substantial soon.

House hunting sucks

3 things to talk about....

so the house we had an offer on was officially denied, they wanted 20K more than we were willing to spend so we passed...it had a huge hole in the roof and needed a whole new one not tomention whatever damage resulted from the hole and water damage. so yeah, 3 months we waited for that answer. nice. we have expanded our search to a little farther north of where we live right now, looked at 2 yesterday. one way out of our price range by like 50K and the other was nice but the main power lines ran right behind it. which isnt all bad sice it gave us tons of space behind the fence to run Es RC cars and play ball and whatnot but living near main power lines has been assiciated with a higher rate of childhood cancer so yeah, that threw that house right out the window. So E andhis parents are looking at a few more tonight. me and the baby stayed home since we had him out way past his bedtime last night just to look at those 2 places.
so i think we decided not to even try with a short sale property as this last one was 3 months of waiting and waiting sucks.....so we are back to square one.
and we would like to be in a new house by february as thats when our fixed rate mortgage turns adjustable and we got a letter the other day saying our payment would most likely go up like $250 a month....and that doesnt include the HOA which also kicks in next feb at another $250 a month and thats to live in a 3rd floor apartment which is quickly turning more ghetto by the day.


and that leads to my next topic. our fabulous community. this past sunday we looked out our windo and there were 2 guys grilling in their driveway. not a big deal on itsown. of course most people do it on their balcony but whatever, so they were grilling chicken and had a tent to keep the sun off. ok, getting more ghetto but not too bad yet. the best part was that they had brought their tv out and run the powere and cable lines outside to watch the football game, while they grilled and ate chicken. ther were 2 of them. TWO OF THEM. you think the a/c inside would be more comfortable but i guess you just cant take the ghetto out of some people. oh, wait, i forgot, WE live in the ghetto now ;) and to add to the swell-ness of our living arrangements i was outide yesterday and kicked something metal on the ground. so i looked and i thought i was mistaken, but no, it really was a bullet casing. yup, you read that right...a freaking bullet casing. now i know there havent been any gun shots here but seriously, why was it on the ground in my parking lot?!?! :) i love my condo community...oh wait, i forgot, its not a condo community anymore, they are renting them again becasie people wont buy here, sobasically those of us that bought before the market crashed are just screwed......

and the third topic....we went for our one year check up. he weighs 19lbs 12oz. hes not even 20lbs yet. that puts him in about the 8th percentile for weight while being in teh 50-75th for height. so we had a long talk with the doctor about his eating. he was eating lots of table finger foods beofer i went back to work but my MIL will only feed him puree. shes afraid he'll choke. adn e is afraid she'll panic. so if he doesnt trust her i definately dont. a little background info: she fed E puree until he was 3. and he drank milk from a bottle till who knows when...7? (but most latin families are like that...even ones that have lived most of their lives here) so yeah, we are trying to feed him table food at dinner. last night he ate like 5 tiny pieces of chicken (if that) 2 pieces of carrot and a few watermelon. pieces. tonight he ate a piece of bread, a itsy bitsy piece of carrot and like two little bites of turkey lunch meat. those two meals together shouldnt even be enough for a snack. so i have no idea how we are going to put weight on him. ???????


other than that things are good. work is great. i love my kids. they have a test thirsday or friday so we'll see how well they do....

Birthday Pictures

So here are the pictures from EJs first birthday. We decorated with Curious George since the only thing he has attached himself to is his monkey....i dont think he really even noticed but thats ok, i liked them :)

Opening presents was fun, his attention span got him through about 2 presents until he had had enough....bedtime was quickley approaching and he certainly let everyone know it!

He was unsure about the cake, watched everyone as they sang and immediatly took the little Curious george figurine off the cake and played with that. He had no desire to eat the cake and even though we put his hands in it he really just wanted to play with the monkey.
Amelia saw that EJ was having trouble understanding what to do with the cake so she thought she would helphim out by showing him that you are supposed to eat it......
and she ended up having more than he did!

The big birthday weekend....

went well. EJ is now "officially" 1! I cant believe how fast time goes and how big he is. he's practically running around the house and wanting to play with everything he shouldnt. Unfortunately I have been super sick since last thursday and that seriously put a damper on the weekend, but my best friend sara and her boyfriend matty flew in from Philly this weekend which was awesome. it was great to have them here. and they brought food for the party and apparently matty loves to wash dishes and washed every dish in our house by hand the entire weekend. it worked out well! :)
saturday morning was spent cleaning and straightening out before the party. people started to arrive about 2:30 and everyone was here by 4. it was nice and low key (13 people) which was good since i spend the first half curled up ion the couch in a fleece jacket and under the blanket wishing i could just crawl into a hole and dissapear. i was upset because i could barely move and i was missing my son's party but then i puked and was able to join everyone else (nice huh?). he opened presents and got a lot of cool stuff and some super cute clothes (thanks sara!). cake also went well although he was pretty uninterested in the actual cake, he was more excited to play with the miniature curius george figure on top. but thats ok, Amelia helped him out with actually eating the cake. she would sneak up to his high chair slowly reach out her hand and then pull a piece off quickly and into her mouth (like she didnt think we would all see her!) it was super cute.
overall a success...and there are pictures to follow.....

sunday we (E, sara, matty and i) went on a driving tour of miami to see all the "important" miami stuff. it was a nice ride and i actually got to see stuff i had never seen before. we ate at fridays as the baby was cranky and we needed a "kid friendly" environment. the food was good i guess but since i got sick i havent really eaten much (i had 2 wontons at fridays). we headedhome and watched some stand up comedy and then i was off to bed.

monday (hooray for long weekends) we drove out to the everglades and "alligator hunting" well not really but we drove down loop road which is a dirt road through the everglades where you can look for gators. we saw a few. apparently it usually only takes about and hour and a half to drive through but the road was flooded over in most places so it was a slow muddy ride. my car was super pretty afterwards!! it still needs a bath.

First days at La Salle..

have been good, of course there have only been 2 thanks to Tropical Storm Fay. Having Monday and tuesday off were nice and i have to say that Fay was an increadibly dissapointing storm (i am not saying thats a bad thing.). we went out this weekend to stock up in supplies like baby food and bread and canned food and water and the like but in the end our power never even flickered and we have had thunder storms worse. But i am NOT complaining, i am sure another will come and make up for the dissapointment i am sure we all felt not having to suffer in the heat with no ac or power or any other "luxuries"

la salle has been good. so far so good. i have 2 freshman classes and 3 senior classes. the freshman are ridiculously cute for now, however i am sure that will all change. and i already know which senior level class will be my trouble makers and "annoying" class. already they dont want to shut up, but thats ok. i am going to email all the parents this week and tell them that this particular class seems to think my class is a joke and if that doesnt work i will start to single people out. that should fix things pretty quick i'm sure. but all in all they seem like good kids, some just lack in the "smarts department" as Sister Pat, my principal told me today.

the other teachers i've befriended are cool. easy to talk to and one is my department chair and so far i really like her. we also get to eat for free in the cafeteria which is AWESOME, it really cuts down on my morning prep before heading out the door at 6am and also keeps food cost down, always a bonus, not to mention the food so far has been pretty good. and while my legs are super achey from walking aorund all day and my voice is fading things are good.

Work is going well. Students report on friday and so far everyone seems really nice. so far so good. today some students came in to help the teachers put their classroom together and move all the books into the appropriate rooms. i had a few girls helping me who were awesome. As i was organizing stuff I was listening to two of them talk about their summer and their boyfriends and their summer work projects. One of the girls was talking about how she was mad at her boyfriend about him going out with his friends and leaving her "home alone" or whatever it was. It made me think about how lucky I am and how happy I am that I have such an amazing relationship with my husband and how we have matured from that high school immaturity of having "ask permission" or "give permission" for someone to go out. E came home today and told me he was going out with the "boys" on friday and my immediate was response was "thjats cool, what're you gonna do?" and he told me.....but whats really nice is that I didnt care that he's going out without me nor do I care where or with whom he's going. trust is an amazing thing and was definately something that came with age for sure. and i do the same thing, neither one of us has to worry about what the other will say or if the other will be mad. we definately dont do much together anymore with the baby but thats ok. we enjoy our family time together and do get out occassionally alone. i even remember when i was pregnant not caring that he went out, he definately hung out with me and did his "husbandly duties" by bringin me take out or ice cream or whatever but i have never felt he had to always be there. of course i sometimes wish i could go too but thats normal. So back to the girls in my class....they were talking about this one girl's boyfriend and as soon as they started talking about it they were on to something else...amazing how quickly their train of thought changes...

Back to Work

I had my first day at La Salle this past friday. it was ok. i, along with about 8 other new teachers were orientated (is that a word?) from about 9am to 2:15. it was a long day but honestly it wasnt that bad. they didnt read the handbooks verbatim only told us the stuff we ACTUALLY needed to know, which was nice. YEsterday we relaxed. tried to go to sawgrass outlets but as we got htere the sky opened up and there was torrential down pour and severe lightning storm which was nice enough to follow us home. so we were stuck inside the rest of the day. today was much of the same. we ran some errands, returned some stuff and finally bought another real car seat for E's car. and pizza for dinner. it was a very romantic way to spend our anniversary! :) i highly suggest pizza and beer for an anniversary dinner. :)
today i decided again it would be a good idea for me to play soccer again (i suppose i sort of have a love hate relationship with it. i love it, it hates me) i am SO out of shape. but it was 7 v. 7 with 2 girls on the field and it was fun. an hour long and in the morning (11am) so it wasnt too bad. however i am now a tad sore. ugh.
back to work tomorrow. :( that means i have to get up early, get the baby ready and out the door and then be productive.....icky.....work sucks. but at least i think i will really like where i am teaching and the people i will be working with. so thats good.
i had more to write but i am way to tired and will be headed to bed momentarily, and probably fast asleep by 9....

Many Updates and other sorts of stuff...

I havent written in awhile, not for lack of stuff to blog about but mostly I have been unmotivated as the days draw to a close on my summer vacation. tear. new teachers report tomorrow. TOMORROW!!! ugh. i am so not excited about giving up the role of stay at home mom. i like that role. i wish i could keep it.
so anyways. E is in Costa Rica this week on business. its lonely without him but it could be worse, it could be longe i guess. The baby is walking, not well as he is too impatient to only walk. his body moves faster than his legs can go so after a few steps he reverts to crawling, although he has successfully walked from one end of the living room to the other. He is eating more solid food. like sandwiches and bananas (when he can pick those up, theyre a little slimy which makes grasping the little pieces difficult) and chicken and tofu (although my tofu didnt come out well for me, sort of had the consistency of soggy bread. gross.) although the baby liked it. i went shopping for new clothes for work as my new job requires that i look respectable on a daily basis, something that was not required in public school. not a big deal in and of itself but with the ability to wear jeans and school related t shirts to work every day my wardrobe isseriously lacking in the business appropriate attire. so we went shopping. $350 later i got 7 shirts and a dress. and some accessories. the shirts generally werent that expensive but when i went into The Limited and tried on a size 6 dress that actually fit i bought it (it gave me a huge ego boost as pants sizes are ALWAYS larger than that by a size or 2 or in some cases 3) so i bought it....and a necklace and bracelet to go with it that totalled $130 just for one outfit. oh well. however ALL of the shirts i bought are black, white or a combination of the two (including gray). so satuday it will be my goal to buy something in color. anything in color would be nice.

Swim lessons are going well. He is floating by himself for a short period of time which is cool to see, although he does cry the whole time he IS doing it. and its not a real i'm scared and hurt kind of cry, its a whiny i dont want to do this and am unhappy that i am not in control kind of cry, which isnt all that upsetting to me like it is to some other parents. Yesterday he got turned face down in the water. let me tell you how much he did not like that! when he rolled back over he was pissed off and certainly let you know it, but he was trying to turn himself over on his own which is cool, he knows what he needs to do, he just needs to get better at it.

in other news my little cousin (although not so little, shes a senior in high school) won 1st place in "Connection Idol" in Hartford Conn. I've posted the link here - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7f6UCyojOVk - she has an amazing voice (I had no idea she could sing) and while you wont understand what she's saying because she is singing in Japanese I'm sure you will enjoy it.


The first picture is from our very long wait inthe airport when we flew home in July. He's looking out the window at the planes...or something at least..
This picture isnt good quality but it shows how much he actually loves the swing, it is probably one of his favorite things to do.
here hes eating a turkey and cheese sandwich and bananas. you can actually see all 4 teeth here too :)
And me and EJ with Lindsay and AMelia at their graduation from the "Baby's First Year" mommy's group we've been attending since he was 2 1/2 weeks .