a taste of fame

A friend forwarded me an email where her group was looking for people with kids between 0-24 months to apply and have the opportunity for their child's picture to be used for something in the future (ads or package, etc). You had to submit a picture of yourself, your child, and the two of you together. If chosen, you compensation is a pack of diapers and a small gift card to Target. Of course, we know how cute Owen is so I submitted his pic (and mine too)...what I did forget to do is submit the application but nonetheless we were chosen to partake in a photoshoot.

The photoshoot was quite painful because Owen still becomes stoic in front of the camera as well as the last thing he wanted to do was sit still or listen to directions when we had this new place to explore. At the end of the hour (which felt like 8), I was ready to get out of there and I wondered how they did this all day long! I left there knowing, our pictures weren't going to used and knew when they said 'Owen did great today!' - it was probably something they said to all the parents that day. Last week, the photographer sent out a CD with some pics and they were actually kind of cute but I know we don't have a future in this industry!

dancing to your own beat

Owen's dance move resembles cow milking motion ... he balls his little fists together and pumps them vertically up and down to the music. He's trying to mimic us snapping our fingers to the beat.

Today we were filling up the big red beast at the gas station as part of our weekly shopping routine; Owen's dancing in his car seat and humming along to some techno music. Tom is standing outside Owen's window mimicking him and making silly faces. Well, the nice old grandma pumping gas behind our car is not aware that Tom is mimicking Owen and believes the guy has gone crazy making funny faces at his tinted window and dancing oddly (doing the Owen and transferring weight from side to side like he has to pee badly) to no music while pumping his gas. Eventually, she realizes that there is a child in the car and is relieved knowing she is not pumping gas next to some insane person...yes, kids have a way to make adults do silly things.

Rough Morning

Yesterday morning, I'm getting ready upstairs in our bedroom when over the noise of my hair dryer, I hear Rocky excitedly take off out our backdoor onto our deck and shortly after some more dog paw noises followed by lots of yelping...as if someone was trying to kill him. I quickly run over to the window to see what was the matter and all I see is Rocky's neck stuck between the spindles of the deck. He's freaking out (he literally pooped his pants, but luckily he wasn't wearing any) and Tom is trying to wrench his head back through the bars. I quickly run down there to help - eventually, we had to take a hammer to knock one of the spindles out of place to widen the space enough for him to dislodge his head from the deck. We have no clue what got into him, he's chased many animals in the past and each of those times, he had remembered to exit the deck via the stairs. Below are his battle wounds...

old friends

I can't believe that Tom has not seen one of his best friends ever in 10 years...especially since they only live about 90 minutes from us for the last few years. Yesterday, Wes Dubois and family made the big trek from Columbus, IN to visit us. The boys had a great time playing together. They have 2 boys - 4 yrs and 18 mo. Owen, normally a passive guy who willing always shares his toys, actually was possessive about them and actually got into a tug of war over the pooh car. As I thought about it, he usually plays with girls so i'm sure that's why he has no problem sharing, that's his lure tactic. But by the end of the night, they were very good buddies. Here they are watching their dads play Wii Sports.Hopefully, it will not be another 10 years before we see them again...

leave your message after the tone...

IT'S FINALLY HERE!!! Yesterday, I was greeted with a box from Amazon, containing the newest 2 Stephanie Plum novels. I'm going to have to rethink this pre-ordering thing next year. I'm sure some people have received their book and finished in the time it took Amazon to send it to me. Anyways, I like to think I've got self control since it's been 24 hours and I haven't yet teared into it...actually, I had a soccer game last night. I hope to get reading on this book sometime this weekend so if I don't answer the phone or your email...you'll know who's got my attention.

First Trip to the Zoo!

We bought a season pass this year since we figured it was a good way to tire Owen out and enjoy some fresh air. I have never visited the Cincinnati Zoo before and was excited. New this year is a giraffe exhibit - I guess they haven't had giraffes in a few years. The neat thing is that they had elevated the platform so you can almost see them eye to eye!

One of Owen's favorite exhibits yesterday was the polar bear. Since he could go right up to the plexiglass and the polar bear did walk right by him to the pool, he got see him up close!

traveling carnivore

Lately, Owen's been eliminating everything meat out of his diet. When we were in Sodus over Memorial weekend, I don't know what got into him but he ate meat like there was no tomorrow and ofcourse, made a liar out of me. Of course, I was quite happy we were able to round out his meals with some protein and had hoped that he would bring this back to Cincinnati but no go...since we've left Sodus, we also left behind eating meat...cherries are his new favorite thing and so he constantly has something dyed red.