Jesus, The Easter Bunny, & Elmo

Tobe, Isaac, and I spent Easter by ourselves as a family of three (perhaps more like 3.7) this year and had a nice day of mixing the religious and secular aspects of this springtime holiday. We only took a mere 134 pictures of Isaac by noon today. Here are some of our favorites:

Friday's Easter Egg Hunt with Morgan

(Again, no good pictures of the two of them together. This is going to make the wedding slide show quite difficult.)

Bluebonnets!

We ventured out to the side of a highway entrance ramp to snap these. Thank goodness for photo editing software as we were able to crop out the Albertson's sign in the background!












No Easter celebration is complete without your own live bunny to chase around the backyard

Isaac and Bunny sharing a piece of bread
Hunting eggs in the front yard

Digging through the goods in his Easter basket

(By the way, Isaac might have made an unusual association between Jesus, the Easter Bunny, and Sesame Street. Every thing in his Easter basket was Sesame Street-themed, with the exception of the bunny. Even his eggs were filled with Elmo and friends characters. I never thought I would be such a sell-out to "The Man")

Just in case you care....here is a picture of Isaac with his Easter basket this year and a shot of him with his basket last year. I guess it is true that if you feed them, kids sure do grow!

Happy Easter!

Baby Update...

I waddled into the OB's office today for my appointment where both Evelyn and I received a clean bill of health. My blood pressure was excellent (it usually runs on the low side--at one appointment my doctor asked if I needed to lie down), I had lost a pound in the last two weeks (nothing to be concerned about--there is just no room in my stomach right now for food. I lost five pounds one week while pregnant with Isaac around this same point in pregnancy. However this one pound weight loss did make me wish I had really pressured Tobe to get me the ice cream sandwich I was craving last night!), Evelyn's heartbeat was 140 bpm, and she is head down in the official "birthing position." I had my doctor mash around on my stomach to see what baby body parts were where (I cannot tell, just like I cannot read a sonogram to save my life). I had been assuming that baby girl's bottom was pushing up on my right rib cage because this is where I have a lot of pressure and pain. Oh no. It is her foot. She basically is kicking her way out of my stomach, with her head down, her bottom right in the middle and her feet firmly positioned in each set of ribs. This one is feisty, I can already tell!



Here is a fun pregnancy story to share with you readers: After my doctor's appointment (I went alone because Isaac was still napping and this was just a "routine" appointment), I headed out to Kohl's to exchange a pair of shoes for Tobe. While there I of course felt drawn to the children's section. Boys shorts were on sale so I rummaged through them hoping to find a size that would fit Isaac (I am desperately hoping we don't also have to buy expensive adjustable waist shorts from The Gap like we do with his pants). I found a few pairs to bring home and try. After shopping the Children's section, I looked a bit longer (and longingly admired the non-preggo clothes) before making my purchase. AFTER I had paid for the shorts and exchanged the shoes, I caught a glimpse of myself in a mirror. Firmly stuck to my ever-expanding belly was a big rectangle sticker with "Large" written on it several times. Apparently a size sticker from an article of clothing had unknowingly become stuck to my pregnant belly and I had been walking around Kohls with basically a sign reading "Large" on my stomach. Nice.



In closing, I must say that it is week three of Dancing with the Stars and I have yet to comment on it. Never fear, dear reader, I am watching and have already chosen a few couples to root for during this season. I am currently cheering for Joey Fat-tone, Lalia Ali, and Ian Zering (aka Don K.). If you live in my area and watch DWTS, then you know that last night's broadcast was pre-empted for live weather bulletins. I feel like people need to be aware of tornadoes, however I don't feel like we need a 45 minute discussion of such potential weather. At one point our ABC affiliate had a newscaster come in who used to live in the potential tornado area and discuss different streets that might be affected, they discussed the damage a tornado did to that same area years ago, and they had a random caller discuss how he thought he might have spotted a funnel cloud while leaving a local Chinese restaurant. All of that is great, but while these meteorologists and newscasters droned on and on about potential weather I was missing Survivor sing "Eye of the Tiger" on Dancing with the Stars. I called my roomie (who lives in last night's so-called "tornado alley" and who technically has not been my roommate since 1999) to make sure she and her family was safe (and had a moment of panic as the phone was ringing that she would leave the safety of the bathtub to answer my phone call). Despite the fact the supposed tornado was a mere two exits down from her house, she personally was not even getting rain, much less the baseball-sized hail Pete Delkus told me the whole area was getting.



ABC finally cut back to Dancing with the Stars for the final five minutes, where I joyfully watched the random Miss USA and her partner (whom we refer to as "Pin Head") get kicked off. Although I was able to witness the actual results of the program, I was quite mad about the 45 minute weather interruption for the rest of the evening. By the time Tobe and I crawled under the covers to go to sleep last night, I was still angry and lectured to him about how weather interruptions should only happen during commercials and not during such important programming as Dancing with the Stars. And people say pregnant women tend to be a bit hormonal....

Here are some "belly shots" from today so you can get a better image of a "Large" sticker stuck to my pregnant tummy.

By the way, I have finally found a pair of maternity jeans that I do not want to back over with my car and set on fire out of anger. I actually went with the "real waist" jeans, despite the fact that they have elastic in the back, belt loops (who wears a belt while pregnant?), and are supposed to fit right at the belly button. I hate anything hitting at my belly button--even when not pregnant--so I just fold these over in the front. The back elastic keeps the pants high in the back, which prevents embarrassing underwear exposure (I find that the semi-panel maternity jeans almost fall off my bottom every time I bend over, which can cause a bit of a scene at Toddler Story hour at our local library). This particular pair is from Motherhood Maternity and were on sale ("real waist" maternity jeans are a bit pricey, so look for a sale if you are cheap like me). If you see me in the next month, most likely I will be kicking these jeans! (or perhaps a floral MuMu if I go into another hormonal rage about unnecessary weather bulletins and completely lose touch with reality)

Snips &Snails & Puppy Dog Tails

Today marks Isaac's 20 month birthday. I think I will be a bit sad when he hits the two year mark and it is no longer "hip" to count one's age by months (however, as I myself am days away from turning 30 I am SOOO glad counting months stopped at the age of 2!). I am tired today after a restless night of pregnancy dreams, numerous bathroom trips, and an overall inability to get comfortable so Isaac and I skipped our normal Tuesday activities and stayed at home this morning. Although I would have preferred to have laid on the couch watching Rachel Ray (who wouldn't?), Isaac and I headed outdoors to tend to some household chores and enjoy the beautiful weather.

Isaac helped me re-pot two peace Lilly's that were in desperate need of a new home

(He also managed to trip over one and sit in the other one somehow during this process)

We took his new car out for a spin around the neighborhood and stopped to enjoy our local neighborhood park

(Which is a bit of a death trap for children under the age of 5 and, according to my mom, a spot for the local teenagers to make-out)

Mommy and Isaac self-portrait before going down the slide together

(In case you are an ACU alumni and you were wondering....yes I am wearing a t-shirt that says KJ Krew that is ten years old. I am a loser.)

Upon arriving home from the park, I informed Isaac that we needed to water our newly planted flowerbeds. This boy LOVED the water hose and would run into the spray. We knew he was a water baby last summer (just like his mama) when he took to the pool like a little fish, but who would have known a sprinkler on a cool morning would be so fun?

I love how silly he is in this picture and how you can see all the teeth he has gotten/is getting in the past six weeks!






After spending a good thirty minutes playing in the water, Isaac was soaked! I had to str*p him down in the driveway. You can tell what a skinny tiger he is when he just has on his diaper!


If you are bored today, feel free to come over and Isaac will happily play in the sprinkler with you!

**By the way, there is another new post below this one. I should get a gold star for posting two blog entries on the same day. The double entries might have something to do with the fact that I have taken over 100 pictures of Isaac in the past 24 hours and I feel the need to share some of these treasures!**

Springtime Fun

Isaac and I ventured out to take some Spring pictures of his 20 month old cuteness. Because I swore after our traumatic experiences at the portrait studio for Christmas and 18 month old pictures that I would not subject Isaac to a professional photographer at Easter, we headed to our local botanical gardens for a quick photo shoot before he was let loose to go "pay." Notice once again that there are no bluebonnet pictures, because I just can't try to strategically place my toddler in a field of flowers that resides only on the side of busy interstates. (Tobe and I were going to attempt this together on Saturday but the ground was too muddy after all the rain).

Enjoy!

Not really sure what he was looking for in this tree, but it was quite interesting to him. What I did not catch on film was him eventually falling over the big tree trunk and saying, "UhOh Mommy tree" repeatedly.



Running like a madman on the playground

"Trash Mommy"
(He is currently fixated on all things that could be qualified as trash and feels the need to throw them away. It has really cut down on our need to vacuum casa de phillips)

Happy to be going home

Random Tidbits from the Day:

*I originally put Isaac's new sandals on him, which did not go over well. He kept saying "No Mommy, No, no, toes, no shoes Mommy..." He wouldn't even attempt to walk in them. I hope he gets over his dislike of his summer sandals because I personally love them!

*Yesterday Isaac woke up for his nap calling out for "Bunny."

*Last night at dinner Tobe told Isaac that after we finished eating the two of them were going to work in the garage. Isaac then proceeded to load everything up into his bowl and say, "Done." That boy loves to play outside and in the garage!