Summer vacation begins today!

Summer vacation is supposed to officially begin today even though I have to go back in the office tomorrow to finish up some reports...last year at this time I was waiting for Trey to arrive.  Can't believe he's almost ONE!!!

Yesterday I signed up for Woodlawn Swap n Play which is a neighborhood play co-op.  I can't wait to meet some families in the neighborhood, and it gives us a great place to go to play.  They also have music and other events.  Should be fun!  I've also been frequenting the Book Babies storytimes at the library and trying to find other free things to do around town.  Tomorrow we have a playdate with one of Trey's "friends" from daycare.  Need to keep this mama and baby busy!

Trey at the Woodlawn Swap n Play

Here are some pictures from the last few weeks:

Tango and Trey - buddies forever and partners in crime

Could they be any cuter?   

 Randy introducing Trey early to the important things in life

 My sweet boy - 11.5 months old

All dressed for summer in shorts and sandals.  

This outfit made him look like such a little boy.  

What happened to my baby???

If you ever need to find Tango, just look for Trey.   

On all fours!  If he wants to crawl, he does an army crawl on his tummy, but he is getting up on all fours more and more every day.  Hopefully, soon he will start doing the regular crawl.

Wow, what a day!

Yesterday was such a full day!  Started out around 515am being awoken by our sweet boy, and before he even went down for his first nap around 8am, I had done laundry, done the dishes, fed each of us breakfast, watched the first part of the Today Show, played with Trey, and read him some books.  Then, while he was sleeping, I finished my grading for PSU and got my grades posted.  Phew!  Moved my PSU file boxes down to the basement ASAP since I don't have to think about it again until next spring.

Trey's timing of waking up worked perfectly because just as he awoke, Nyree showed up for a visit.  Trey and Nyree got to bond which was so fabulous.  I wish I would have taken some photos, but I didn't.  After Nyree left and Trey took a short (only 30 minutes!) afternoon nap, we went to meet Sara, Finley, and Silas at the park.  Here is a short video of the boys in a swing.  I apologize in advance for my high pitched voice. I need to do something about that.

Sweet Silas (who happens to be the same size as Trey and half the age...)

Now each boy gets their own

After we got home from our playdate, Trey and I went to visit yet another daycare.   I wish I had a crystal ball that I could look into to help me decide which daycare will be the best fit for us.  Right  now we are trying to decide whether to go with an in home daycare where Trey would be the 9th child being cared for by a husband and wife, or with a different in home daycare where Trey would be the 3rd child cared for by a stay at home mom whose husband is sometimes there.  Of course, what comes with the lower number of children is a higher price tag.  Decisions, decisions.

After our daycare visit, I dropped Trey off with Randy and went down to meet Julie and Tim at our house in Lake Oswego.  After being on the market for four-ish years, it has finally sold (thank god) and closing is on Friday.  Granted, we haven't spent any time at the house in the last four years, but it is still really sad to let it go.  We had some champagne, sat on the floor of the family room, and reminisced about childhood and growing up.  When I did the final walk through, there were some tears shed as I thought about never going back into my bedroom or my parents' room again.  In a weird way, I still feel my mom's presence at that house and it is sad to say goodbye.

Part of our growth chart from growing up

After we loaded up the final few things, Tim, Julie and I went to Village Inn for dinner.  We were easily the youngest patrons there by at least 20 years.  Village Inn was one of my mom's favorite restaurants (not sure why since the food isn't the greatest, but oh well).  Finally, the last stop for the night was a quick trip to Winco to get some things for Trey and supplies to make TREY'S BIRTHDAY CAKE!!!!!!

Walk #1: Complete Disaster

So originally I picked a walk that was going to go through Portland Heights and down through PSU and then up to Goose Hollow.  I noticed in the book that there were 179 concrete steps just on the first staircase alone, so I quickly decided that was not a good walk for Trey, his stroller, and me.  I looked at few others and then thought the walk that went through Reed College and around Eastmoreland looked pretty simple.  I noticed the words "wooden staircase" in the first few pages but then also read "after you get to the bottom of the staircase, the ground levels out."  Great! 

Well, let's just say the wooden staircase should have been my first warning.  I got to the bottom of that staircase god knows how but Trey was certainly jostled around quite a bit.  I realized once I got to the bottom that going up would be pretty impossible, so I thought I would just give it a go.  I should have figured out before I even got out of my car that I was not equipped to do a nature walk, but sometimes I am just not very bright. 

This was the first major obstacle we encountered (if you don't count the wooden staircase); however, I was already pretty sweaty from trying to keep Trey's stroller even ON the trail. Those boardwalks that I thought sounded really cute and sweet were not wide enough for the stroller.  I figured this out the hard way on the first one. 

How did I get over this log, you ask?  (Remember, I couldn't turn around because the thought of backtracking made me a little nauseous.)  Well, I had to take Trey OUT of the stroller, climb over the log, put him down on the ground on the other side, hoping beyond hope that he wasn't going to put his new army crawling skills into use on this path and go over the edge, and then rush back to the stroller, LIFT it over the log, put Trey back in the stroller, and continue on our way.  Good god. 

This was our next major obstacle.  I couldn't take Trey out of the stroller this time because I couldn't risk that he would crawl off of the boardwalk into the WATER below.   I ended up lifting the entire stroller with Trey IN it over these logs.  Remember, friends, I am not very strong.  Although after this lift, I realized I could lift the stroller over the other obstacles that we encountered, so that is what I did.  Imagine me, sweaty, out of shape, and a little scared pushing Trey along this narrow path and trying to talk to him about all of the beautiful things we were seeing (mostly trees and the pond).  I figured at least one of us should get some pleasure out of this nightmare. 

When I got to an overpass for walkers, there was another "wooden" staircase that went up and next to it was dirt that I could have pushed  Trey up, but it was pretty steep.  I walked up there on my own because there was no way in hell I was going to push Trey (or carry him) up that hill and then find out that I couldn't go anywhere from there.  Needless to say, I was pleasantly surprised to find that at the top of that hill was the beautiful Reed College campus.  Now I just had to figure out how to get up there.  Luckily, as I was standing there desperately trying to decide how to get my sweet boy to the top in one piece (he had been quite jostled at this point), a man came down the steps.  Oh thank god.  He helped me carry the stroller to the top and we were on our merry way on blessed pavement. 

Does he look worn out to you?

You should have seen his mama.

Here we are, back at home, safe and sound, having lunch.  Trey's favorite - watermelon and grilled cheese.  This boy would eat an entire watermelon if I let him.

Lesson learned today:  read about the walk more closely before leaving the house, verify somehow the surface we will be walking on if we are using the stroller, and obtain a backpack pronto so we can do the walks with stairs or dirt trails through nature parks. 

My new summer project

I have a new summer project.  Trey and I are going to walk all 20 of the walks from this book:

Portland Hill Walks

The one I'm planning on doing today or tomorrow is three miles and is called "Portland Heights to Park Blocks and Goose Hollow Loop".  Although I just noticed there are stairs and not sure how I will manage that with the stroller.   (Okay, so I just was reading about this walk and it says the first staircase has 179 concrete steps...I think I will need to wait and do this one with a partner.  I think I will do "Reed Canyon to Eastmoreland Loop" this week which is only two miles and has no stairs.)

For those of you who know how much I love tour guide books, this is a perfect project for me because I will get exercise (damn that lingering baby weight) and get to learn about the city.  Can't wait!

Finally some sunshine

Dear Reader, I know it has been a while, but it has been busy around the Clark house.  Right now I should be working on my grading for my class at PSU while Trey is in bed and Randy is out fishing with Jason, but instead I am sipping on a glass of wine, catching up on recorded shows, and working on my blog.  Over the past few weeks, every time I think it might be a good time to work on the blog, I think of something else that is more pressing...laundry, dishes, preparing for class, playing sudoku on my phone, reading, taking a shower...Trey's naps aren't long enough when you have a long to do list!

My happy boy after a breakfast of waffles with raspberry jam

The next few pictures are from the middle of May just before Trey turned 11 months old.  We had a family get together at the Lucky Lab in what I like to call a "penis revealing party" to find out the gender of Julie and Tim's baby.  They had their ultrasound that morning and then came and told everyone at once.  Turns out there's a penis!  I am so thrilled that Julie and Tim are having a boy and that Trey will have a playmate, buddy, best friend, partner in crime...you get the idea.  Julie is doing great and is 22 weeks pregnant as of today.  She is starting to show and also starting to feel him move.  I can't wait for this baby to be born!!

Randy and I got our garden planted two weeks ago.  We always get too excited, plant too early, and then have to replant because of the bad weather.  Randy lost all of his pepper plants already (8 of them), and I have lost both of my cucumber plants as well as the basil.  Damn.  Guess I need to mark on my gardening calendar that we need to wait longer next year.  Vegetable gardening is something I have really grown to love over the past 5-6 years.  Last year I didn't do as much as normal (go figure), but I'm hoping to get back into it this year.   I can't wait for Trey to be able to "help" me in the garden!

This is where we put Trey while we were working in the garden.  

We went to the beach over Memorial Day weekend with my family.  We stayed at the beach house where we have stayed for years.  The view of the ocean is awesome, and I love to sit out on the deck and read while listening to the ocean.  The weather was shockingly great and it was great to have Trey down on the beach.

 Trey reading one of his favorite books with my dad

The big news on the Trey front is that he's started to move!  I don't know if doing the army crawl counts as crawling, but that is how he is getting around.  Once he figures out that his speed will increase dramatically if he gets up on his hands and knees, I think he will really be going.  Here he is with Tango after moving from our front room to the tv stand and then down the hall.  The unfortunate part is that even though I had JUST vacuumed about 10 minutes prior, he was covered with dog hair.

Trey is officially done with daycare and home for the summer!  Randy is staying home with him for the five days I have to work in June, and then I get to be home with him all summer.  I am super excited to spend the summer with Trey, but sometimes I feel exhausted just thinking about it.  What on earth are we going to do every day to keep ourselves busy?  Stay tuned...

Being a mom and missing mom on mother's day

Maybe it's because it's spring time and I'm reminiscing about this time last year when I was hugely pregnant with Trey, but I am feeling as scatterbrained and flaky as I did a year ago.  This week I bought something at a plumbing store, put it down in the parking lot to load Trey into his carseat, and then promptly drove away without my purchase. More than one person has told me that it's fortunate it wasn't the other way around...

Mother's Day is just around the corner and I have been thinking a lot about how much I love being a mom and how much I miss my mom.  There have been multiple incidents over the past few months where I want to talk to someone about something very specific about motherhood and when I go through my mental list about who to call or who I want to talk to, the list gets whittled down to one single person - my mom.  I didn't miss her as much when I was pregnant as I thought I would, and I didn't miss her as much during childbirth or right after as I thought I would, but I really miss her now.  Some lessons my mom taught me that I hope to emulate include telling and showing Trey on a daily basis how important he is to me, taking care of my husband so he is happy and comfortable, and reaching out and trying to be a loyal friend to my girlfriends.  My mom also had little tricks that she used to keep her household running smoothly which I find myself doing and little oddities that annoyed us that I can see coming out in myself.  Also, as I have told my dad and my husband, I think I officially have my mother's body.

But on to Trey...I know these pictures all look pretty much the same, but I love them all and couldn't decide which one was my favorite.  Isn't he just the sweetest boy?

Some of Trey's favorite things right now include windows, lids, and anything we don't want him to touch (specks of dirt, electrical cords, my cell phone).  Just recently, he pulled the curtain back in the window in his room and saw outside. His eyes opened in wonder as if I'd been holding out on him for so long.  Now every time we sit in the rocking chair, he immediately goes to the curtain and pulls it back to look outside.  He also loves looking out the window in our bedroom or the living room, especially if it includes watching his dad come home from work.  He's also really enjoying putting lids on and taking them off of tupperware.  We've been giving him a lot more floor time to build those baby muscles, so we got a new rug at IKEA.  I can set him on the rug surrounded by toys, but inevitably he goes for the piece of dirt that I didn't get vacuumed up.

Trey has been eating more and more "real" food.  Beyond baby pureed food, he currently eats things like chicken noodle soup, eggs, waffles, french toast, pancakes, yogurt, sweet potato, bread, graham crackers, cheerios, corn chex, and... my newest discovery thanks to Sarah Long: bagels and cream cheese.  One thing that he does not seem to like is applesauce.  Here is a series of photos of Trey being fed some one day.  You get the idea...

This was the Friday before Easter when we were pleasantly surprised with a visit from my dad.  Dad drove up from Eugene to bring Trey his first Easter basket.  He brought him a cute teddy bear and some yellow tulips for Mama.  They bonded for a little bit, and then my dad drove back to Eugene.  I love these impromptu visits.

Randy and I went to the spring brewfest with Kris and John.  Trey is a real trooper during these events.

On Easter morning I gave Trey his first Easter basket.  Little did he know that it is a basket that my mom gave to Randy five years ago (or at least parts of it) with a book about Easter that I have been reading to him for weeks.  I figure he doesn't know the difference and next year I will do it for real.  Or maybe he'll get this basket again since he won't remember anyways...

Here is Trey dressed in his cute Easter shirt during our brunch.  I love seeing both my boys "dressed up" in their collared shirts.  I'm such a lucky girl...

Last weekend we went down to Eugene for three nights.  Trey was sick with another cold, so he wasn't his usual delightful self, but it was still nice to spend some quality time with my dad and Sandy.  We also got to spend some time on Monday with my dear friend Sarah who is recovering from surgery.   The ride home wasn't as smooth as I'd hoped...what does one do when they are driving alone and have to pee and there is a sleeping baby in the back seat?

 Trey at his first baseball game

Trey and Grandpa eating graham crackers (not sure who got more of the snack...)

The rest of this month has some exciting things coming up: finding out if I will have a new niece or nephew, a trip to the beach with the family, and the end of daycare (for now).  Summer is just around the corner and I can't wait!  Now if I can just motivate to do some work in my garden and yard.