Today and Monday Sienna had a playdate with Nico. No pictures from today so these are from Monday.
This sequence cracked me up. There was an Elmo doll on the bench and we put them on the bench so we can take pictures of them. Top left: Sienna finds Elmo. Top right: Sienna shares Elmo with Nico. Bottom left: Sienna is chagrined, why did she give up Elmo? Bottom right: Oh Elmo, I’m sorry I left you! Nico: I’m outta here!
Sienna goes into the sprinklers. She never went into the sprinklers before, she usually would stand right outside the sprinklers and look at it. This time she went in. Starr said that Nico normally doesn’t get as wet as he did on Monday. We think they influenced each other. Notice in the next pictures that Sienna is wearing different bottoms. I thought she was done getting wet when I changed her. Clearly she wasn’t! At least I put her in water shoes.
Monday was also the 2nd day we tried the one nap a day schedule. It seemed to work out ok. After being at the playground almost 2 hours, Sienna was tired and fell asleep on the way home. Once home, we had lunch and then I put her down where she proceeded to stay awake for an hour before finally falling asleep and slept for 2 hours. Tuesday she surprised me by basically telling me she wanted a nap a little before 10am (she motioned up and then put her head on my shoulder, pointed and said go) Wednesday was also a 2 nap day. Today was a one nap day and showed signs of weariness by noon. I put her down after lunch around 12:45, checked on her half an hour later to see she was still awake (but quiet!) I told her nap time and I guess she fell asleep shortly after. So I guess I’ll just take each day as it comes.
I’ve been making stuff here and there and have not been good about posting them so here they are! Back in June I was obsessed with finding a nice headband pattern to crochet so I can wear it as a sweatband when I exercise. I printed out a whole bunch but did not get very far with a lot of them for one reason or another. I finally made this
I did have trouble with it because the pattern did not make sense to me. The creator of the pattern was kind enough to answer my questions on it but then never replied back when I had a follow up. I was told by a super knitter/crocheter from the craft meetup that I did it correctly and that the pattern was a little confusing! Whew! Not just me! I am also working on a blanket (starghan) for Sienna that is well on it’s way but I have not taken pics of it yet.
Yesterday I finished up the Year of the Pig t-shirt pillow. Most of Sienna’s old clothes were given away but there were a couple of things I didn’t want to part with, namely this year of the pig shirt. It’s a little lopsided but hey, I’m still a sewing novice. I realized after the fact that it would have been cuter and easier to keep it as a t-shirt and just sew up the openings. Oh well!
And last but not least, my Gocco projects. I finally relented and got a PG-11 that came the week after my birthday. I did not play with it until this past Sunday. It was quite humid on Sunday so I believe that made my original stick to the master. I was totally bummed about it. Questions posted to the yahoo and flickr group were made. It was suggested that I rub a little warm water to get the bits off. It worked!
I’m not totally happy with how it came out but since it’s the first print on my own machine, at least I got over the first print hurdle. Later in the week I made another one.
I ironed out some of the carbon in the printout before flashing the master and this time it didn’t stick! I tried 3 different types of paper with the lower right one embossed. It’s a little better technically but still not super thrilled. I’ll get there!
I wanted to make sure I wrote about the lunch me and Tammy had with our babies to celebrate our birthdays in July. We met up in Queens (!) at Just Like Mother’s, a Polish place in Flushing on Queens Boulevard. I was certainly glad Tammy had her appetite back because we went all out!
We got a sort of sampler plate with pierogies, stuffed cabbage, bratwurst, boiled potato, sauerkraut/cabbage salad type thing. Then we also got an order of potato pancakes and the meat blintze that I read about here. For dessert we got the small order of apple fritters (although I would like to try the blueberry blintzes next time-that’s right, I said it, I would go back.) The stuffed cabbage and meat blintze were the true standouts. I prefer the pierogies and apple fritters from Raymund’s in Williamsburg but everything was quite tasty considering it is Queens. 🙂 (In case you didn’t know, we have a running joke that everything in Queens is inferior to anything in Brooklyn and recently stated that I don’t mind visiting Queens but I wouldn’t want to live there and that’s no joke. HA!)
Sienna was perfectly happy eating plain bread with her fork and Zack was asleep the whole time! Tammy gave me the Real Simple Meals Made Simple cookbook for my birthday and I already made the super sized meatballs in it! I gave Tammy lavendar and geranium organic soap and hemp lotion as I was thinking about her rash and hives from the pregnancy. Of course I gave it to her 2 weeks later at the BBQ!
Last Saturday we had another BBQ and what a lovely day for it! (Sunday turned out to be rain and thunderstorms!) It was also Zack’s first social outing and his first time to Brooklyn (I don’t think he wanted to leave!) Baby brain be damned, Tammy and Mark brought over 7 layer Mexican dip (YUM!) and Pete made deviled eggs brought over in the nifty carrier (need I say YUM?) and Nate got delicious lemonade in cool bottles! (Poor Mari had to work!) Joy managed to come by at a decent time and brought delicious donuts from our place and Italian cheesecake from her hood. Since Richard couldn’t make it with his dog Casey, Skippy was on good behavior, as good as he usually is anyway! Joy laughed at me for going all the way to Dyker Heights to pick up stuff for the BBQ. I don’t care, I’ll be going back, especially for their Orange Italian soda! All in all it was a nice relaxing day, filling our tummies and chillin’ with our friends!
We had our first official family beach vacation earlier this week on Long Beach Island, New Jersey. Overall it was a nice time, great to get away and not be sucked in by my computer. There were some trying moments and general things we learned from the trip but I am glad we went. Originally, we were looking to rent a house for a week but it didn’t work out so we found a room at the Sea Spray Motel. It turned out to be more money but with the heated pool option, it was worth it.
We got there around 2:30ish and after a few minute wait, our room was ready. Once Sienna woke up from her afternoon nap, we jumped into the pool! It was nice to be able to get in right away without shivering from the cold water. For dinner, we went to Fred’s Beach Haven and while the food wasn’t terrible, we didn’t have a desire to get back there again. The evening was a little bit challenging as we were not used to being all together in one small room. Her pack and play fit nicely next to the bed and it took her about half an hour before she finally fell asleep while we quietly read our books on the bed. (I noticed that each night, she fell asleep at 8:30 no matter what time we put her down.)
Monday morning was the beach! (Of course, after having a delicious breakfast at The Chicken or the Egg where our faith in good dining on LBI has been restored) Besides a quick toe dip in the sands of Coney Island, this is Sienna’s first time on the beach. At first it seemed she did not like the sand but quickly took a liking to it. The water was COLD!!! I did not expect it to be so cold! So Yves and Sienna developed a quick game of “run away from the water” in between making sandcastles.
So one of the things we learned not to do on vacation next time is change up Sienna’s routine. There were a few days before vacation where it was hard for us to get her to take her morning nap. I knew the time was going to come where her morning nap was going to end and thought it was now. So we decided to forego her morning nap and just put her down right after lunch a little earlier. It seemed to work out ok at first but then she just seemed to be more irritable later in the day. Another thing we learned is not to do too much. Monday and Tuesday we’d go to the beach in the morning and then the pool in the afternoon. I think that might be too much for her especially since we usually only have one outing on a regular day. I had her pool seat on the side of the crib on top of the luggage rack and found her sleeping on it!
Lunch on Monday, we just walked over to the local deli, Black Dog Cafe where Yves got a delicious sandwich (we went back there again on Wednesday). Dinner, we decided to try “LBI’s best thin crust pizza” at O’Malley’s Pizza and Grille although I was skeptical about how good an Irish person can make a pizza. HAHA It was not bad! Yves thought it was okay but he has such high thin crust pizza standards!
Tuesday afternoon, we checked out the playground that was a block away from the hotel. They had some nice slides and there was no one there! It was nice to be able to go down the slide and not have to wait for the other kids to use it. Although Sienna did have to wait for her daddy to finish using the slide. HAHA
Too bad the sun was blinding when you come out of the slide! And of course we got some ice cream afterwards!
For dinner Tuesday night we went to Panzone’s for some pasta and discovered Sienna’s like for spaghetti! The food was pretty good even though the waiter screwed up my order.
Wednesday we had breakfast at Uncle Will’s pancake house. It was yummy! You can see what we got by the pictures and this time we learned not to order Sienna her own dish since she only takes a couple of bites from it!
After giving her her morning nap this time (!) we went back into the pool for the last time where we encountered admirers of Sienna. They were totally enamored by her and would not stop following her around the pool! It was cute at first but they were totally violating personal space and it was getting annoying. Their dad finally told them to ease off after we had to tell the girls to give us our space!
We decided to head back home after the pool on Wednesday instead of Thursday morning. We did feel a little cramped in the room but mostly because we haven’t gotten a good nights sleep since the bed was just horrible. For some reason, the mattress was higher in the middle so the sides were kind of sloped down. So we figured there wasn’t any point in staying another night since we were leaving early in the morning anyway.
Last Monday was an overcast and muggy day so I decided we should go check out the new Ikea in Red Hook! It would give Sienna a chance to run around a little bit and have lunch in the same place! I also wanted to check out some table and chairs for her. The children’s furniture is so colorful! My only issue is that I would prefer to be able to get in and out of a chair on her own so she doesn’t end up toppling over like she does with the beach chair we got for her. I guess she is still a bit on the small side as all the chairs were a little too high for her. I know I just need to wait a couple of months and she’ll probably fit them fine! We had lunch at the Ikea restaurant and this is actually the first time that I’ve had their meatballs! They were quite tasty and such a bargain! Sienna’s kid’s meal was just $1.99! The fries were so yummy that I ended up eating all her fries but gave her some of my mashed potatoes. I also ended up buying the colorful plastic utensils and small bowls.
It was funny to have her eating a meatball on her own and see her people watching. It was really kid friendly there with some play areas all around the store and family bathrooms and stuff. Ikea Red Hook was a bit of a pain to get to only because they are doing construction on Hamilton Avenue right under the overpass. So I don’t know how often we would go.
For Independence Day, we decided to go into Chinatown for a dumpling lunch since it has been awhile. We went to our usual place right next door to the Chinatown Ice Cream Factory on Bayard Street and I can’t remember the name! The food wasn’t as good as it used to be but still tasty nonetheless. The train ride over was a bit of an adventure since Sienna wanted to explore the train but we didn’t really let her, much to her dismay!
We went to J&R first so Yves can pick up new headphones and walked through City Hall Park. Sienna liked the fountain.
After lunch we got ice cream next door (pretty expensive especially since it’s Chinatown!) and went over to the park.
Saturday we had a BBQ and we were ready to invite more people and have different foods to grill. I was actually concerned about inviting too many people and that actually worked against me because it was a low turnout due to everyone’s busy summer plans. But Richard came!! He brought along his boyfriend Billy and dog Casey, which Skippy took an instant liking to….all afternoon! Yup, looks like Skippy fell in love (or lust) and would not stop humping poor Casey, which confirms my belief that Skippy swings both ways. It got to the point where we had to separate Skippy several times!
Anyway, they also brought a wonderful fruit salad and sangria! Brenda came and brought ice cream sandwiches. I saved myself some trouble and bought pre-made beef burgers and chicken burgers. I was at this supermarket in a predominately Italian ‘hood and they had all sorts of pre-made burgers with stuff in them and kabobs and such. I could have easily gone crazy! I also bought hot dogs and made pasta salad. Joy, in true Joy fashion, showed up a couple of hours late with her lime marinated chicken, after we all ate! I even called her to make sure she didn’t get run over by a bus. Guess that is the mom in me now! (Me and Joy ended up cooking the chicken later on for a late night snack. Late for me cuz it was 9pm!) Even if the low turnout we had such a nice time and the weather was fabulous! Wonderful breezes and not humid.
Friday was my birthday. If you don’t know how old I am, you don’t need to know. 🙂 My parents were taking me out for dim sum so Yves left work early to meet us in Sunset Park. We tried a new place on 65th street, where the building used to house a Saturn dealership! I think the name was East Garden. Overall, it wasn’t bad but I prefer the new place we went to for Mother’s day instead. Afterwards, we went back to the house and had strawberry birthday cake. YUM!
A dim sum family portrait Sienna loved the don tat!
Last Wednesday, I met up with 2 moms (Dana/James and Ashley/Caroline from the Brooklyn Moms meetup) at the Prospect Park Zoo. Sienna hasn’t been there since last summer and in the baby bjorn so it was fun to see her reaction now. She was walking all over the place and started getting upset when I tried to prevent from going certain places, like closer to the kangaroos! This probably would have been an ideal place to bring the “leash.” She enjoyed the petting zoo area in the barn and was laughing when I was feeding the alpacas. I was trying to get her to feed them too but she got a little scared. Plus her little hands can only hold one or two morsels of the food so the animals weren’t interested in her offerings! LOL
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