Wilmington Flower Market

Yesterday, we visited the Wilmington Flower Market!

Wilmington Flower Market = Carnival = FUNNEL CAKE:
Michael had his first funnel cake and he LOVED it. What is the Wilmington Flower Market not like? It's not like a flower market. I think they had like 3 booths TOTAL that sold plants. It was an excuse to have a carnival.

Michael rode every ride. And of course, the carousel. Where did my little baby go? The event was held at Rockdale Park in Wilmington. We drove through the windy backroads of PA and DE to see the tented park near this tourist attraction:
That's right. A tower in a park. Can't say things are THAT much different than in Europe. :)

Here's Michael with my parents and the fish he won. My parents bought him enough tickets to ride every ride. TWICE. Grandparents...gotta love 'em:And this is what I did while my mom rode the ferris wheel with Michael. Which pic do you like better? The one where the wheel looks bright and cheery? Or the one where the sky has a gloomy look? Or neither? It's ok if it's neither. You can put that in the comments. Something to the effect of: "I don't like either of these pictures because I don't want to see you practicing with your camera." That is fine too.

And where are the pictures of meeting Thomas and Brian's grandparents? I am excited to post those...but to be honest...they need a bunch of post processing because it was the 1st time I took pictures in months. So some of them need cropping because the composition isn't great or they need some tweaking for color/brightness in photoshop because I didn't expose the frame right. SO there is a slight delay...but THEY ARE COMING! Here's one that I like right now:


Also, am going to post pics of Michael with the farm animals too from the Wilmington Flower Market. Just had to get this POSTED.

Thor's Hammer

So it's kind of hard to see from the pic, but Michael is wearing a shirt with a cartoon figure on it called, "The Mighty THOR."

For those of you who knew Michael in the womb, "Thor" was his womb name. So it was absolutely awesome that Brent/Tracy brought Michael this shirt when they came to visit.

And this is his mighty thunderbolt-wielding muscle pose:
Hope you enjoyed your late afternoon walk as much as we did.

What do you do when grandparents leave?

You give out haircuts. First up, Brian. Take a look at our before and after pics:

B - reminiscent of Sasquatch (or however you spell that):
Post haircut and beard trim:

Pre haircut side view 1:

Post haircut - still a bit of mushroom effect from middle school, but not half bad for my 1st time giving a haircut since college days:
Pre:

Post:

And the back pre haircut:

Post:

Artfully avoided his wild and wooly cowlick.

Pretty proud of myself. My last attempt at a homemade haircut resulted in 2 small slanted lines in the back/center of his head that caused a little girl sitting behind us in church to stare at the back of Brian's head in fear.

Next up: Michael.

Pics of meeting Thomas and grandparents visit up next once I proof them!

Love,
P

THAT'S IT

I need to vent. I am going to pay someone to take pictures of Michael and I. I just can't 1) remember to do it or ask someone to do it for me, 2) Make Michael smile for it, 3)Take the picture right.

There were 440 pictures taken this weekend. I have 5 of just Michael and I. Of these 5, there are none of Michael looking at the camera.

The last picture I have with Michael, was in December 2009 at Au Petit Margeury. That makes it nearly 5 months that I have had a good picture with my one and only son.

And I have to take matters into my own hands now. Because I think there are more pictures of Michael with his aunts/uncles/grandparents than with his own mother.

That being said...we got a ton of great pictures of Michael with Brian and his Dad this weekend. And lots of great ones with Thomas. But now, I can totally understand why both my mom and Brian's mom have both approached me with the camera and said, "Please take a picture of Michael and I. I just really need it."

Us moms...we just have to fend for ourselves!

Poll

So I was looking out my window today in our house and I thought to myself:

"Eating on my deck, overlooking the forest on our peaceful 2 acres of land...or eating on a rooftop, overlooking Sevilla."

Which would you choose?

One other thing that HAS to make the blog for me:
Today, Michael climbed into my lap, gave me a huge hug and kiss, and said:
"Mommy, I love you so much. We will always be friends."

I hope that will always be true. I'll remind him of this day when he's 13.

Photos...finally right?

So I'm sure you're sick and tired of all my wordy posts. I sure am! But I have not picked up my camera in weeks (if not months). But thank GOD for my iphone! That thing exposes surprisingly well.

Anyways...here is a recap filled with pics of random instances in our last 4 months here in the NE.

Our apartment used to be within walking distance of a Dairy Queen. One day when Brian had the car at work (we were sharing 1), Michael and I decided to take advantage:
Here's our house covered in the huge snowfall this year:
A little out of order, but last Tuesday, Michael and I ventured into Amish country to see the outlet malls in Lancaster. To be honest, it was my excuse to go to Cracker Barrel, and Michael and I shared this strawberry shortcake dessert:

As you can see, that dessert is much closer to Michael than me. He got a brain freeze though and I got the rest!!

Had to get a tractor for our life in the country. Here's Michael's first ride on a tractor at Home Depot:

Little did I know that Brian would take another 3 weeks to decide on which tractor he would actually buy (it was a John Deere).

Michael and I have done a lot of shopping in the last 3 months. I was in search of a cheap mattress set so I ended up at this REALLY cheapo furniture store to see what they had.

To get a feel for the place, let's start out with their kid's recliners circa 1970:

Michael was super impressed with their baseball chair. And honestly, who wouldn't be?

Here's a picture of Michael sitting at the desk under a bunk bed. He made me pretend he was the cashier and I was supposed to pay for things with my $1. This is him banging on the table demanding money:
Check out that sweet baseball ottoman in the background. It goes with the also sweet baseball chair.

We ended up at Kohl's back in February some time. Michael got one of their pseudo shopping carts and announced to me that they had shopping carts for kids here! He took it over to some necklaces, inspected them, and put them back on the rack. After this, I was not allowed to touch the shopping cart.

Here's Michael looking at some guest bedroom bedding I was considering but did not buy. Chk out his Zoolander-ish hand in the pocket pose:For entertainment, I let Michael play with my iphone. This is the picture Michael took in the bedding department:

Bet that's not something you see everyday.

So 2 Thursdays ago, The Besancons found themselves doing this to save a buck (or rather $150)...
That's right. Ghetto stylin' it by transporting our mattresses home via the roof of our car. This avoids PA sales tax and a delivery fee. And the guy gave us over 50% off on the mattress set because we were taking it that day!! The only thing missing was us with our hands out the window holding it down.

Another sales day...Michael at Pottery Barn. Here he is posing at a possible night stand:

We didn't buy it because the top was attached crooked on the top. It hung about an inch more on the right than on the left.

Michael going crazy on the right. This is my inspiration for my bathroom. I've got these warm-ish light gray walls and I bought these light blue/turqouise towels for my bathroom:Michael LOVES these decorative wheelbarrows at Pottery Barn. He thinks they are for him:

Makes me want to buy the kids sized wheelbarrow from Land of Nod for him. I was told NO. By guess who...

Last Thursday, I took Michael to something called "Chinese Boogie." It was semi-hokey, but something to do. This is the dragon they had the kids do:

Don't look hard, Michael's not in that picture. He wanted nothing to do with that dragon and was at the END of parade line of kids.

So my kid is a photographer waiting to happen. I hope he loves this hobby as much as me. Here are some pictures he has taken with my iphone. I LOVE the angles he gets:

View out of his car window. I know it's dark and of a warehouse...but I like the sky:

Of Mom in the car:

I love this picture:

A more serious pose:

Mom paying bills:

And for those of you who are bored...my latest design inspirations.

For my guest room...I intend to do a color scheme kind of like this. I have the walls a light blue/grey under the chair rail. Going to definitely do the black frames...but instead of the light light pink for the kick...I'm going to have a dark-ish cherry red:
I'm going to incorporate some bling with the red and some mirrored furniture or opt out of the black frames and go with mirrored frames like this room at Ethan Allen:

This room is also my inspiration for my grey bathroom. Notice a lot of blue/mirrored stuff? I guess I'm in a glam phase for the little bits of the house where I get to be girlie.

To offset it, are some very traditional couches we will probably get:

Yes, that's Michael taking a nap and Brian chking his blackberry.

We're thinking a dark honey colored leather...these couches have a slightly puffy arm with nail studs. I'm not a huge fan of nail studs to be honest...TOO traditional for me because I am more of a "Transitional" decorator. BUT...the couches are comfortable and I like them. So I may put these traditional pieces in the living and opt for some modern fabrics or modern end tables to give the room some interesting points.

Here are some fabric swatches keeping with the traditional couches and the colors in my rug. See, the arm isn't TERRIBLY puffy like most traditional pieces are...but the nail studs make it so.

I'm not THRILLED with the boring color choices there...I'm looking for something a bit more graphic...just need some PUNCH in there!

I like the shape/color of the wood of this dining room table. It kind of matches our cabinets and the black legs matches our granite:
But I am drawn to the upholstery in this chair here with the green and cream and it's shape. Wonder how to use it???
VOILA! More pics than words I hope! And maybe I'll have some new pics to post after this weekend???

Love to all,
P

Crap About Blogging

WOW! 2010 can be the year known as when we really dropped the ball on blogging.

To answer a question I've been getting: The house is officially listed as 2200 sq ft at the tax assessor's office. I think it really is 1900 sq ft with an additional 400-500 sq ft in the basement.

I just need to jot some things down so you may want to skip this post if you want any useful information. Skip to the end about Michael's latest funny antics.

March 26 - closed on our house

March 27 - moved in with lots lots lots of help from Joen/Tony; The Gaglianos; Bill/AK. Spent the 1st night in the house up wondering if I could breath because I was allergic.

March 28 - Bill/AK leave in the early afternoon and we spend our first day/night on our own here.

Lots of unpacking happens after this. I resolve my allergy problem by 1) cleaning the air ducts/ steam cleaning the carpet to get the cat dander out (which I am allergic to). This in turn, got my allergies under control enough that my nose stopped running/stopping up enough for me to get my nasal spray to penetrate in my nose and work. Gross, but effective. Now 2-3 days after figuring this out, I am almost normal. Also helps that the trees are almost done blooming in our neighborhood and we ran the air conditioner for 2-3 days which helped to filter out some more allergens. Yes, I am allergic the country. Thank God for the French system of medicine where my Ob/Gyn wrote me a prescription for a year's worth of my allergy medication. In America, I would have had to go to my allergist also once a year to get lectured about getting shots and then get my prescription for the year. Don't argue with me about which method is actually probably safer.

I digress. Not going to complain about how I finally got a doctor's appt for Michael for a well kid check. That is a blog for another day.

Also another tangent. Grocery shopping at the American grocery stores is getting boring. I figured out why. It's because all the shelves are always stocked full of everything. They might be out of 1 thing...but it's highly unlikely. It's probably just behind something else. In Paris, you NEVER knew what they would have in stock and what they wouldn't. So going to the grocery store was actually quite a surprise. At the time, I found it an annoyance. Now, I find it boring that everything is always in stock here.

Trader Joe's though...they sometimes run out of things. I tell you, if I didn't have Trader Joe's, I'd be in a real bind. If you want stuff that's the most similar to French stuff, you can go there. It's my happy place. I love getting their "Fearless Flyer" and finding out about the "new" stuff they have that's developed straight from France. And their frozen Indian food ain't half bad either.


OK...MICHAEL STUFF

• I was showing Brian how the different pedals change the sound of the piano. Michael decides to take over and says, "See Daddy, when you push this pedal, it makes it sound like Coldplay." IF ONLY!
• We passed by a cemetary and Brian says, "Here's a cemetary. It's where dead things go." And MIchael responds, "That's where stinkbugs go!" We used to get a lot of stink bugs at the apt and Brian would capture them into our bug jar until they died. Hence, Michael's frame of reality.
• Michael likes to point his finger a lot. When he's talkin' to you, YOU know it.
• An oldie, but goodie: Michael tells me he is scared of worms because they don't talk.
• Michael and I played our first piano "duet" today. He played middle C while I played the accompanying adult part. It was actually very cute and sounded right. Am loving having my piano here. Thank you so much to my parents who thought it was useful to give me lessons and buy me a piano.
• Michael gets on the piano 2-3 times a day. I'll be doing something in the kitchen and I'll hear him banging away. I love this.

OK...got our storage shipment on Wednesday. Am ashamed at our accumulation of stuff. I had 4 flour sifters. 2 old fashioned ones and 2 more "modern" ones that used a pumping handle.

For every box we go through, I would say that we are donating about 80-90% of it.

Next Tangent: It is shameful how I wasted money before on "stuff." I am so glad we lived somewhere that had space as a premium. So now, we don't need all the "stuff" anymore. We buy one thing, make sure we love it and it's good quality, and use it until it's broken. Then we replace it. No more accumulating crap. No more buying multiples of things. No more thinking I "need" all this stuff I don't. No more Consumerism. NO MORE!!!!!

My New Home

Hi Everyone!

Michael here...ready to introduce you to the 1st 2 floors of our new home! We'll start the tour off with me sitting in our family room on our new rug. My Dad really likes that rug:

He says it really ties the room together. Mom and dad laugh a lot at that joke and I'm not sure why.

Anyways, when you first walk into the house, you see a little open foyer to the right where the stair case is. Straight in front of you is the family room.
That door on the right leads down to the basement...or man cave as my dad keeps calling it.

To the left of the doorway is our dining room. It is not as big as it looks in this picture:

Welcome to our kitchen. My mom keeps squealing about all the storage space and something about a built-in trash drawer REALLY gets her excited:

If I run from the kitchen into the family room, I would run into this mantle of our wood burning fireplace:

If I look out that window on the left side of the family room, I see this:

My mom says she likes the custom wood blinds. I just don't GET that woman sometimes.

I took this A-W-E-S-O-M-E picture when my mom gave me the camera:

Don't let her tell you that she helped me. I held that huge camera with the huge lens and the huge external flash all by myself.

So now, we enter - The Man Cave: That's my Dad to the left there. This is where we are going to watch loud movies and play lots of man games. Mom's not allowed down here because the walls are green. Dad couldn't stop staring at the recessed lighting and Mr. Bass, our realtor, kept telling us that each one was $125 if we put them in ourselves. I kept asking about when we were going to watch a movie down here.

Here's the other side of the basement. See the stairs to the left there? I almost fell down them once and there was no handrail to hold onto. Mom DID NOT LIKE THAT. Let's look out the window of the basement too while the grownups talk:

That's it for now. She forgot to take pictures of the 2nd floor. Maybe she'll do it after we move in? I think she was more worried about how the toilets were going to flush. We seem to need excellent suction in them from time to time.

Pop Tarts

Michael had his 1st pop tart today because they were free at the free breakfast our apt provides. He told me it was good.

It has begun. The consuming of processed goods. I am glad it did not start until age 3.

I know it won't be his last pop tart. But I know we will never have pop tarts at our house E-V-E-R.

It tasted like plastic. My son likes plastic. UGH.

P

Quick Weekend Recap

We had a nice weekend despite the rainy, gross weather.

Friday:
I HAD to get out. No ifs ands or buts about it. So we just got in the car and left. No plan. Ended up at Iron Hill Brewery in downtown Newark and LOVED it!! It was loud, busy, and very cool (kind of like Iron Cactus in Austin) and the food was great. It reminded me of the restaurants we used to eat back in the day in Austin and I just really needed that! Michael inhaled his dinner of fish and chips, broccoli, french fries and ice cream. Yes, all of it. He loved staring through the window at the fermenter units...good grief...an engineer on our hands. Brian and I split a seafood bisque. Then I had a lump crabcake sandwich with lots of vegetables on the sandwich and as a salad. Brian had a seafood pot pie. DELICIOUS. Perfect restaurant with good food, loud atmosphere to mask Michael's craziness, and booths. That's it. That's all we ever ask for.

Saturday:
Brian gave me the day off! SO I shopped at the mall. Ran into Gymboree, got to talkin' to the sales lady and she tells me that she has oodles of kaboodles of sales stuff in the back. There's no room for them at the front of the store so it's just back there...at prices from $1.99-$9.99. She was so sweet and ran back there and grabbed me all sorts of things for Michael that I could go through. I got some pretty sweet deals (shorts for $1.99, pants for $2.99). And I"m going back this week for more! I read some books/magazines at Barnes and Noble because I like to do that. And then it was time to come home to my happy family! I made Chicken Cacciatore and we had Family Movie Night. We watched UP and we still love that movie.

Sunday:
Still raining. Went to our church, which we really like. Michael ate too many goldfishes, starts choking, then threw up the rest. EWWwww...so we hustle him out into the front foyer away from the service and clean him up a bit. Luckily, it wasn't a lot...but it was still yucky. The rest of the mass was just fine! Michael got his first blessing from the priest and he was pretty happy about that! Then we went over to The Gaglianos for lunch. We checked out their bathroom remodeling plans, then played Wii. It was really nice.

That's it. Just wanted to write it down.

Our New Nephew: Quinn!

This weekend, we drove 16 hours to meet our gorgeous new nephew, Quinn! He is lovely and makes very cute faces. We never really heard him cry much so he is certifiably perfect. Uncle B was pretty happy about meeting his new nephew:

We did not have much time to get many pictures this weekend what with the eating, pooping, sleeping that we did...oh wait, that was Quinn. BUT! We did score my favorite picture of Quinn in his Man U onesie:

I think Quinn was enjoying his nap in this picture:

Wish I could have gotten there a couple weeks ago when he was comatose and asleep! Could have come up with some pretty cool newborn shots I think! Quinn is starting to be more alert and wakes up a bit easier (as normal at a month old!) so it was a bit hard to get him just right!

We had an awesome time!! ON Friday night, we arrived there at 1:15 am because we sat in rush hour traffic around NYC. ROOKIE MISTAKE. Then on Saturday, we had some pretty rad donuts for breakfast, played at the park in the afternoon while John was at soccer practice, and had a yummy dinner at home from Not Your Everyday Joe's. We watched 500 days of summer and Brian fell asleep at 9pm. Yes, the parents of the newborn outlasted Brian. NICE.

Sunday morning, we went to John and Kelli's very warm and welcoming church. Had a quick lunch/brunch at a local bakery and hung out at home/park. Michael got to spend some quality time with his uncle and met Bella for the first time. He was smitten!

It was a great weekend to spend time with our family, something we really missed being so far away. This is one of the biggest reasons we moved back Stateside. We just were tired of missing everything. And we loved our weekend! It satisfied our "travel itch" that comes about once ever 2 months or so and it made us happy to be around the newest addition to our world!

Love,
P