Today is glorious ...

rain OR shine. It's just far too nice outside temperature wise (think spring!) to not be spending it outdoors!

If you don't believe me, ask this little person below ;)

 

Folks, it's almost over ...

the doldrums of January that is. I don't know what it is about January that makes it a particularly hard month to get thru. Maybe because it follows one of the most festive/happy times of the year .... the fact that the weather was unusually cold this past week or that it's just gloomy and blah. Time for vacation for this little lady/family! Nothing is planned yet, but if I'm not on a plane by the end of February headed somewhere toasty, I will most likely need to be institutionalized ;)

A is almost 7 months old and even though she isn't extremely mobile yet, it is still hard to keep her entertained all day long ... especially when you are stuck inside due to the rampant spreading flu and cold weather.  We have our weekly music class on Tuesday and a few other various mommy-and-me activities to get us out of the house throughout the week, but between trying to keep her on a quasi normal nap schedule and the fact that she is a ticking time bomb waiting to go off when meeting people at bars and/or restaurants, I'm forced to stick close, if not stay IN the home a good portion of the day.

I remember Hubs and I discussing what we each found appropriate for entertaining our child before A was born ... no mobile devices before the age of 16 ... absolutely no iPad ...... and TV?!?! The horror!! Well ... turns out once your sleeve of tricks has been emptied, you will pretty much do anything for a moment of peace and quiet. Case in point: here A sits watching who even knows what on nick TV ...

She was rather enjoying herself, even if it did only give me maybe 10 minutes to do some brainless internet catch-up.

Not only have I learned not to place unrealistic ideals on ourselves and our parenting, but that my daughter cannot rock anything in fuscia. Noted!

Christmas/NYE at the Erhardt's ...

I feel like I have sat on this post now for far too long and I can no long cover Christmas/NYE over the course of an entire post. We are almost into February for pete's sake! Where does the time go? This whole Mom thing makes the days pass through your fingers just like sand. The minute I sit down to write I'm being beckoned from either A's crib or I have 10 loads of laundry calling to me from the hamper.

I'm pretty sure that Hubs would not be too pleased about my picture selection from our tripod test run, but it really is the only photo that showcases a good portion of our small tree. Notice the heart cutout ornaments and the little bearded heads (which I realize sounds totally creepy!). They are a couple of the selected ornaments from Ikea. The bearded folk are what we refer to in Sweden as "Tomte" ... aka the Christmas gnome.

Hubbie also got a little crazy outdoors and decked out the front bushes:

*My personal fav Christmas accessory being the wreath ...

And just because this pic is beyond cute, here is little A with her new friend Katie (whom my Aunt made for A by hand):

*Katie and A had QUITE the convo that night on Great Grandma's chair 

I think that is going to have to wrap up Christmas (no pun intended ;)). Time to move into the present with more regular posts :)

The Holidays

Since this blog is still technically about our UpstateHaven, I am collecting a few pics from our Christmas and New Years spent there. I should have them all uploaded and ready to go tonight :)

Below is a pic (albeit grainy pic) of our living room after we got the tree up. Can you spot the feline?

The time is flying ...

and I had hoped to be "moved" into my new blog space by now, but with most things these days, it is taking a bit longer than expected. SO, I will continue to blog from UpstateHaven for a bit longer until I can get things organized and ready to go.

A is now a week shy of being a 6 month old, which BLOWS my mind! It seems that with each stage you are convinced they can't get much cuter or more fun, but then they pull all these new tricks and faces out of their hats and BOOM ... cuteness overload.

That tongue makes an appearance in at least 75% of all photos ha

Now that I FINALLY have my bearings and things have leveled out a bit, I will be back to normal posting on this blog (and hopefully the new blog very soon).

Hope everyone had a magical holiday and that the new year has gotten off on a positive note!