Submissive Chalk

Marty finally found some chalk that knows how to fall in line. 

And if you ever find yourself short one caboose? Colored bubbles will do in a pinch.

Boys and Blood

Poor little busted lip boy. He fell at pre-school today. His teacher is new at the school this year, and I think Marty was the first to bleed on her watch. Poor Ms. April, she just kept apologizing and telling me how it happened and explaining how carefully she tended the wound. My heart went out to her. The sweet lady felt so bad. She must not realize that around here, a day isn't complete until a body part is scraped, bruised, or perhaps a little bloody. My short tenure as a "boy mom" has convinced me that boys are just meant to get banged up. Rough and tumble and fearless and wild... how quickly they find ways to get hurt. But once the kisses are dispensed and the tears dry up, they are just as quickly on to their next adventure (natural consequences forgotten), in pursuit of more ways to test limits. And keep mama on the verge of a heart attack.

WEEK PEEK

Church with these two handsome men, and then a super healthy and nutritious lunch. Marty got to try his first McDonald's Happy Meal because he has the best daddy in the world who insisted. And also because we are American, and what respectable American almost-2-year-old has never had a McDonald's Happy Meal?

Marty loves a splash pad, so it is especially convenient that we have one in our backyard. Perks to living in a mall, I suppose. I took him out to run off all that post-nap energy, and he was just so full of life and personality that I couldn't stop taking photos. And the sunglasses. Oh my, he rocked those things throughout the whole splash pad affair. The ladies were impressed, I assure you...

H&M FINALLY opened their online shop, and the Internet was buzzing all about it. So of course I had to hop on the bandwagon and order a few things for my little stud-muffin. My friend is convinced Marty is going to strangle himself with that scarf. In the name of fashion...!!!

We are dreaming of Santa Barbara this week after chatting on the phone with my sweet friend who lives there. I met Ava while living in China, and I miss her like crazy. We are planning another trip out to Cali in the next couple of months. Santa Barbara is to die for, and I seriously cannot wait to see my friend. And the beach...

After more than 6 months of wearing my hair in some variation of a bun or ponytail, this mama got a new look. You know your hair is bad when a) your closest friend asks you how long your hair is these days, and b) your other friend calls and books you a salon appointment followed by text messages with the date, time, and driving directions. Bad hair. Good friends. (p.s.- I have never in my life worn my hair wavy or had it colored this light. My husband is still in shock. Ha!)

Bo was in California all week on business, so Friday night we all three went out for dinner and then had ice cream in the Pearland Town Center pavilion. There was a band playing, so Marty danced around (well, more like spun around and around and around) and we just enjoyed a simple, summer evening with nothing else to do but be together. Being together is the best.

Take Me to Your Reader...

If you are like me and needing a new blog reader now that Google Reader is no more, check out BlogLovin. They have a Google Reader importer that can transfer your feeds!

I just joined yesterday so that I could keep up better with all of the feeds I follow. The reader isn't super fancy, but there is a cute social element that allows you to "like" posts (or even the entire blog), and also see what feeds your friends are following. This is perfect for me. Sometimes I don't really have anything super meaningful to leave as a "comment," but I'd still like to let my bloggy friends know that I enjoyed reading their post. BL also just launched their mobile app, which is always nice to have...

People can follow and "like" your posts even if you haven't registered your blog through BL. You may actually have likes and followers already that you don't even know about yet (like me!). Therefore, if you don't need a reader, you may want to register your blog anyway just to track your following. 

If you do decide to BL as your new reader, make sure you find me! :)

Blue Painted Piano

When I think back on the first time Bo took me home to meet his parents, I really only have one vivid memory. The memory has nothing at all to do with his parents, but rather it is all about their 1940's Baldwin piano, at which my boyfriend sat and played the first song he ever wrote for me. It is really quite romantic dating a musician. And being married to one...? Better.

...I remember snuggling up next to him on the floral brocade seat of that piano bench, leaning my head against his shoulder and thinking how lucky I was to be having that moment right then. So lucky. The atmosphere was perfect. His parents had long gone to bed, the lights were low, and it was just him and me and his beautiful song (and the ginormous portrait of his mother hanging above the piano, but I try to block that part out).

A few years after that night, Bo's parents down-sized their home and asked us if we would like to have the piano. Without hesitation, my man snatched that thing out of his parents' home and moved it across town to live with us. And that is the story of the first time we moved our piano. In the years following, we moved that big, heavy beauty so many times it is a miracle it still plays a note. But it does. And now there are usually 4 hands tickling the ivories on any given night. Two big, two small.

When we moved to TX last year, I looked at our once lovely instrument, with her curvy legs and swirly feet, and realized that we had accidentally beat her to a pulp. The once shiny finish was dull and lifeless, the wood scratched and chipped. Too many bumps and bruises from too much movin' around. Not to mention the shabby (and not in the "chic" way) floral brocade on the bench. Ick. Our girl was in baaaaaaaaad shape.

So we painted her blue.

This was taken right after we finished the project. It has since been moved to its permanent spot and re-accessorized.

I knew we could never afford to have the piano professionally restored or refinished. That costs thousands of dollars. And since I knew I wasn't willing to use up such a huge percentage of the square feet in our teeeeeeeny apartment on something that was not (in my opinion) beautiful, I started searching for a DIY solution.

Annie Sloan chalk paint was our answer. After reading that it was pretty much fool-proof (a requirement), and that you didn't have to do any sanding or priming (very attractive), AND that you could paint indoors with limited ventilation because there are no fumes and no smell (jackpot!), I was in. Somebody toss me a paintbrush.

We chose Napoleonic Blue. Gutsy for sure. But I figured that since we couldn't afford to bring the piece back to any version of its original self, we may as well go polar opposite. We don't like to take ourselves too seriously around here.

So we painted and painted and painted. Lots of nooks and crannies in our girl. We did NOT take the piano apart. I've seen other bloggers who were way more particular and thorough than we were. But we live in a 3rd floor apartment with no garage, and Marty was starting to walk at that point. I had to keep our little project contained, so we just did the best we could. And it turned out awesome. Fool-proof, indeed.

In the end, I probably used about 3-4 coats of blue (which was only about 2/3 of the can of paint), followed by several coats of clear wax. I loved the clash between the antique lines of the piano and the modern finish of the opaque blue paint, so I didn't use any dark wax or antiquing techniques on this project, other than sanding just a few spots to bring out the curves. I also went kind of crazy with the buffing once the wax dried, because I wanted that super shiny look. I love it so much. After we were finished, after the wax had cured, I placed all of my knick-knack and photos back where they belonged and stood back for a look. It was as if we had gotten a brand new piece of furniture. A work of art that quickly became the centerpiece of my home decor. And for the price of a can of paint, some wax, and a few brushes. Happy, happy me.

We ended up moving her to the corner near a window.  The natural light in these pics shows more of the true color.

Almost a year has gone by since our painted piano project and the paint is holding up incredibly well. I haven't touched it up or re-waxed it yet, although I think I will wax the most loved areas again sometime this year. And trust me, this thing is loved...

"The accidental therablog" -or- "Perhaps the deepest thoughts you're ever gonna get out of me"

Just couldn't choose a title for this one... 

It took Bo and I eight years of marriage to talk ourselves into getting pregnant. We had relocated 11 times in those eight years, and we were not entirely sure that a child would respond well to our transient lifestyle. Many conversations were had, many scenarios were discussed, many pros-and-cons lists were made. Did I mention that we were smack in the middle of our three-and-a-half year stint in CHINA during all this?? Oh, the timing...

We ultimately decided to give it a go, figuring that no time would ever be the "perfect" time, and heck, I wasn't getting any younger. I got preggers so quick we couldn't have changed our minds if we had wanted to. And man-oh-man am I glad. Marty was born in Beijing, China on 9.10.11 and I wouldn't change a single detail about how things went down. (I want to write a post about his birth sometime soon).

My Chinese pregnancy test. Couldn't read a word of the instructions. Thank goodness pee sticks are fairly universal.

When I look back on my thought process before I had Marty, I realize how completely wrong I was about so many things. The main one being that having a baby would add more chaos and stress to a lifestyle that has both of those things in spades. But God gave us exactly the kid we needed, as He is known to do. Marty has, in fact, brought so much calm into our crazy life that I can't imagine how we survived without him to mellow us out.

Having him around caused me to slow down and simplify my routine, which resulted in me having less on my plate and fewer things to worry about. Becoming a mom has also made me less self-centered, translating into less time worrying about whether this or that is impressive to those around me,  be it the clothes I'm wearing, my relationship with my husband (how it appears to others anyway), or how many events I get invited to. Since Marty's birth, all I want every day is to impress this tiny little man, which makes me think about what qualities a child actually finds impressive. Does a 2-year-old care if I'm 6 months past the point of needing a haircut or pedicure? No. He looks to me for kindness, consistency, patience, and love.

>>Side note: I'm embarrassed to say that those qualities weren't necessarily tops on my priority list pre-Marty. My mind was once filled with so much anxiety, fed by a desire to be accepted and admired by my peers. Maybe it is just part of being young. I don't know. Does everyone wrestle with this at some point? I want to think that it is a typical part of personal growth (to make myself feel better?), but then again, I want to hope that not many others waste valuable years looking inward when there is so much to see out there.  When I think about how much time I spent worrying about what others thought of me, or if enough people liked me... well, it's just shameful, really. I'm not sure how nearly all of that evaporated with the arrival of my child, but it did somehow. And for whatever reason God saw fit to change my perspective, I'll accept that gift with gratitude.<<

Anyway, back on track... Isn't that brilliant?! Becoming a mother was like a chance to start over as a totally different person. A better, more authentic one this time. Someone who strives to display the characteristics I want to see develop in my child. Qualities that I'd want him to seek in a wife someday. In about 40 years.

It comes fairly easy in these early days, when your hero status is correlated to the number of blocks you can stack (and I can stack high!).  Nice that I get to eeeeeeaaaaasssssseee into this whole transformation thing. Whew! But everyday, I am aware of (and thankful for) those two little eyes that stay locked on me. Those little eyes that are making me want to do better, be better, every single day. I must admit, however, that if I let my mind settle for too long on the fact that I am raising a man... well I start to hyperventilate a little bit. Lord help me.

Mart-man has totally perfected the fist-bump and peek-a-boo. We are still working on closed mouth kisses, though...

Does anyone else feel that blogging is like really cheap therapy? Yeah me, too.

Moving on... Overnight, my baby has morphed into this toddler and is on his way to turning into a full fledged boy. I can hardly even type that without my heart tightening just a smidge. He is just so BIG. Independent like nobody's business. And his buddha belly is shrinking by the minute (which is downright sad).

So naturally, as more and more of the baby disappears, more and more people start asking about the next baby... sheesh. I guess we don't have another 9 years to mull this over (as a matter of fact, I always said I didn't want to get pregnant after I turned 35. That happens in like...5 months. Yikes.), so the conversations are starting once again. Pros and cons of just keeping it like it is. It seems pretty perfect at the moment, but that is what I thought when we had no kids. Decisions, decisions. Tick-tock, tick-tock.

Chalk Train

A few days ago, Marty woke up from his nap especially itchy to go outside. Granted, he wants to go outside pretty much always... but this particular day, he was literally at the front door pounding those chubby little fists with all the spunk he could muster. He is still a man of few (actual) words, but I got the message.

Most days, I'd be totally on board for an afternoon outing. But that morning, at the pool with friends, the sun had zapped just about every drop of energy out of my body. It is also currently hovering around a million degrees here in Houston. Sooooooo hot and humid and sticky, and frankly I just didn't want to leave the a/c. As a compromise, I opened the back door that leads out to our teeny tiny 3rd floor balcony/patio, gave Martypants some chalk, and let him loose. He got to enjoy some fresh air (and make a mess), and I got to sit in the doorway, half-in-half-out, running up our utility bill. (But staying cool, by golly.)

Marty is an interesting little man. He isn't really talking yet, but he is an observer of the world. I swear, sometimes I can actually see his mind working, his wheels turning. After only 3 weeks at his new preschool, his teacher is already predicting that he will be an engineer someday. He loves to stack, and build, and organize, wanting everything to be orderly, in its proper place. And try as I might to show him what you are supposed to do with sidewalk chalk, he had his own agenda. Silly mommy.

It was really very cute (but I suppose all moms think that). First, he tried to balance each chalk piece on its round little end in an effort to line them all up. But those pesky chalks just kept falling down. He'd get one or two to stand up, and then they would all come crashing down.

My boy is no quitter, though. When at first you don't succeed...? Build a chalk train instead!