Week of Absence Update

It's been awhile (almost a week...yikes!) since I last posted, so I figured it was time to do something about it. I'm a fairly introverted person except with friends and family, so I got a little overwhelmed by the out-of-the ordinary attention my blog received last week, thanks to the lovely gals over at SITS, and I felt the need to step back and breathe a bit. I'm slowly getting around to visiting everyone who was kind enough to stop by and say hello, but between taking care of my little one, spending time with J, friends, and family, and carving out a little "me" time in there when I can, it's going to take me until Christmas.

I'll make my updating short and sweet, much like the past week. Bring on the bullets!

• I started getting ideas for Christmas shopping. I know that it is a bit early for this, but I want to get it over with early AND not charge a single thing, so I'm going to try and space it out as much as possible. That way I won't be stressed about having to pay bills and will be able to sit back and enjoy the holiday with friends and family and hopefully devote more time than I have in years past to really meditating on what Christmas means.
• Watched the same four YouTube videos approximate 25,000 times. Not by choice, but by 21-month-old force. Livers is OBSESSED with a few videos, and she knows how to work an iPhone enough to turn it on, go to the home screen, find the correct icon for watching videos, select the video, and then stop it to go back and pick a new one. At first it was adorable to see this tiny-fingered little girl manipulate a complicated big-girl device, and I was proud of her intellectual and technological prowress. Now it's just getting annoying. (Really, how many times can one person watch "C is for Cookie" or that guy singing "Numa Numa"?) Is it sad that I'm going to have to cut back a 21-MONTH-OLD'S iPHONE AND YOUTUBE TIME? I think so...
• Cooked up some new and yummy recipes. I hadn't found a Crock Pot recipe I liked yet...until we made a beef stew one Saturday that made me warm and fuzzy all over. We also did some yummy crescent roll recipes (thanks Growing Up Mo' and Jenny!). And I made butternut squash bread. It's just like pumpkin bread, only more time consuming because you have to roast your own squash rather than pick up a can.
• Watched The Strangers. I do NOT like horror movies. AT ALL. I'm pretty sensitive to violence, and I only agreed to watch it because I thought it was just suspenseful. Note to self, dumb@ass: look up info about the movie before you watch it, because there was gore I was NOT suspecting, and I haven't been able to shake it since I watched it last night. Seriously. Woke up to pee at 5 AM and it took all of my willpower to think of kittens and moonbeams to go back to sleep.
• FINALLY got a pumpkin for the family. Actually, I got two: one for me to carve later this week and one for Livers. She is in LOVE with her pumpkin. She's liked them ever since she first saw one, and if she could carry it with her all over the house she would. She was pushing it in her doll stroller at one point. It's currently missing its stem, as she dropped it on the floor, but luckily for both it is the only casualty so far. I'm thinking of helping her carve it, but I don't know if that would be a good thing or traumatizing to her.
  

Here's the two of us with her beloved pumpkin. I'm not so much a fan of myself in pictures, but this one actually turned out OK (minus the "I look 15 thing").


This weekend was a huge "Daddy" weekend for Livers, particularly Sunday. She is not a child to ever really sit still, and this weekend she was all about some cuddle time with her Daddy. It just warmed my heart to see it :) Below is a picture from after church yesterday. As we were walking out of Mass an elderly lady stopped us and wanted to give Livers the hat she had made. She had extras from a craft fair she was in (I assume), and she wanted to give one to her. I knew she'd love it, because it was a pumpkin hat! She isn't gloomy in the picture, just tired.


Here she is earlier in the day cuddled up to Daddy watching TV and getting back rubs. What a great life!


Here she is later in the day snuggled up again with her Daddy and his (her) beloved iPhone.

Other than the aforementioned things, not a whole lot of note has been going on lately. It's a fairly quiet week for us. I do need to get crackin' on her Halloween costume. Soon. I'm not a huge Halloween person, so I didn't want to spend a lot of money, which means I'm going to make an impromptu one if I can hurry up. If it turns out OK, pictures will be forthcoming.

I hope everyone has a had a great week and has a great one ahead!