Date Day

Yesterday afternoon Jason and I dropped Amelia off with my mom and had a little date afternoon/evening. We browsed a few stores and then went to find something to eat. We decided on Cecil's for dinner and each ordered a sandwich and we shared them:


After we left the restaurant we ran into a little movie theatre and decided to park and see what they had and at what time.


We got there just a few minutes before "The King's Speech" started and we knew nothing about it. Nothing but someone on my Facebook saw it recently and loved it so we went on that and saw it as well. Ironically, we saw it at the same theatre she saw it at too since we were in her neighborhood!

Amelia had a good time with her Nana and Jason and I enjoyed some time on our own.

Our Week in a Nutshell

Things have been busy around here. There is so much to do in the next 13 days that I don't know if it will all get done!

Monday Jason worked late and we had laundry to do. Since he worked late we were at the laundromat until closing time and then we had a vey filthy baby to bathe...at 10 p.m.! I just couldn't let her go to bed looking like this:



Tuesday Amelia and walked to Target for a few things and she fell asleep...


Doesn't look to comfortable to me!

After dinner we took a walk to the park since it was so nice out. Amelia finally decided that the swings are fun:


She also practiced her walking a little:


(she is happy in this picture, I promise)

Tuesday night, Jason's friend from work, Ben, came over so we could go see a movie together at the Oriental one last time. We saw Exit Through the Gift Shop and enjoyed it! Click here to see the trailer if interested! We really enjoyed it!

Wednesday we went to the Milwaukee Public Museum. We decided to skip the exhibit - The Dead Sea Scrolls and the Bible - because there was no way Amelia was going to make it through there. It takes about 90 minutes to go through and strollers aren't allowed and babies must be worn facing forward. Yeah, that wasn't going to happen for us! Oh well, we saved a bundle by just seeing the regular museum!

Here a few pictures from our museum visit:




We had a good time exploring the museum!

For dinner we went to Amelia's, because we have our own Amelia! It is out by the airport and it was good!


Last night I worked the midnight premiere of Sex and the City 2. It was a late night. Enough said.

Today I am feeling under the weather - congested and such. I have been taking it easy and Amelia played with her Ducky all afternoon.



He just follwed her around from room to room (or vice versa) and they hung out.


I have been working on Amelia's table skills and today she ate from a bowl with success!


That's all for now. I am going to take some Sudafed and lay down so I can feel better!

Crispin Glover

What a late night for us! Tonight at the Oriental I worked an event and Jason's sister was in town to babysit so Jason got to come! He was pretty excited to be out doing something!

Tonight, Crispin Glover was at the Oriental with his latest work - It is Fine! Everything is Fine! He first did a slideshow where he narrated some of his books and then the film was shown. After that he did a talkback with the audience for about an hour and after that there was a very extended meet and greet. What do I am mean by extended? Well, Jason was in line for about an hour and he was within the first 12-ish feet of the start of line! I finished work in time to join him in line.


Crispin really took the time to actually meet with everyone. We left the East Side close to 1 a.m. and he was still there, meeting people! Since I was working, he even gave us one of his books for free as a thank you for helping out!

If you are interested in the film, you can go here to his website.

Also, I am sure some people are wondering who Crispin Glover is... Well, here some of his more well-known roles...


See? You knew who he was after all!

Movie Night

Amelia and I had a pretty good day together. This evening we went into the Oriental to sign some paperwork and Amelia climbed the staircases a few times. I wished I had my camera so I could record her because she was cruising up them so quickly!


Now that Amelia is bed, the living room is picked up and the dishes are done...I am going to have a movie night. I watch a lot of movies but I don't ever just sit and watch one. Usually I have them on in the background as I clean and stuff. Tonight, I am strictly watching a movie! I have my popcorn, courtesy of the Oriental Theatre:


I have my movie:


Don't judge! Yesterday I read Twilight and tonight I am watching the movie. My sister and mom passed the Twilight Saga on to me a few months ago and yesterday I read the first book. Yes, it only took me a day to read all 498 pages, even with a one-year old around! I almost hate to admit it but Stephanie Meyer writes a captivating story! I was hooked. I am starting New Moon tonight.

For now, I am prepared to be disappointed in the first movie. After reading the book, I can see how people would be disappointed in the film. Meyer is such a descriptive writer and there is just no way to depict that in a movie.

The Cove

I went to see The Cove tonight and WOW. It was a great documentary. I recommend it to anyone with even a mild interest in the topic. If you do not know anything about this movie and are curious, click here, and you will be brought to the film's official website.

Mother-Daughter Morning

This morning (well, actually, it is after midnight, so yesterday morning) Amelia and I ran errands together. We got up and she had her first taste of pears...which went well. She likes her fruits! After her breakfast we got ready to leave the house.

First we went to UWM so I could photocopy some reading for class Monday. We don't buy all the required texts (either for reason of cost or reason of availability of the text) so most classes have books "on reserve". I have four chapters from two books to read for my graduate course out of books on reserve. I opted to photocopy them to bring home because reading in the library with a very active 7 month-old seems problematic to me. I will need to get that done tomorrow night, no questions asked...she is expecting us to give oral reports on what we read (vs the usual typed papers on everything we read). I would much rather write a paper (I never though the day would come when I would say that!).

Once we left campus Amelia and I grabbed some fast food for a snack because I was starved. In my hurry to get Amelia ready and get her fed, I never ate. After my snack we headed to the laundromat (my work clothes were in desperate need of washing). It was the first time I had ever done laundry without Jason (he was working brunch). I amused myself by using the timer to take pictures of Amelia and I. We got a couple keepers, like this one (note my new glasses):


I had some trouble getting her to look at the camera. Remember, when the orange light goes on on the camera, she does that goofy, scrunched smile. Well, when the timer is counting down that orange light flashes for every second. We were on a ten-second self-timer, so she scrunched up, ready for a picture for about the first two seconds. Then she would get all confused and start looking around. It was fun. I am sure the people in there thought we were weirdos :)

Amelia likes the laundromat. Here she is watching our clothes be washed:


She is bent over like that because she discovered that on the tile floor she could push herself. I would sit her up, normal, and then by the time I got the camera ready she had pushed herself back and was enjoying "the show" bent over.

I was hoping Amelia would take a nap during at least part of our laundromat visit but there were two very loud and active kids there, running and screaming the whole time. Once I tired of playing with the camera self-timer Amelia hung out in her carseat. She would lift her legs and slam them down over and over and at one point she had moved herself into the middle of the room. I see what they mean about warning parents about putting those carseats on elevated surfaces! Had she been on a counter, she would have fell and she wasn't strapped in! Here she is being a good girl in her seat:



Tonight marked my second shift working the Milwaukee Film Festival. Once again there was a movie being screened that I wanted to see :( Every film I want to catch is on a day that I am available to work! Isn't that the way it always goes? The following is a list of some of the films I would like to see from the festival. This list is a virtual list to myself, so that I have somewhere to reference in the future (I will lose a post-it with movie names on it in about 2 hours. This is more finite):

Waterlife
No Impact Man
Seraphine
North Face

I am sure there are more that I have already forgotten, so I might have to add to the list over the next few days. We were able to watch last night's feature (Modus Operandi) in the comfort of our own home :) It was made by a local filmaker and he had copies available. I texted Jason and told him that and he said to pick one up. No sense in us missing everything from the festival, especially when I work at one of the venues!

I had better head to bed because I open in the morning. I am just not that tired yet though! Hope everyone is having a good weekend :)

Little Maestro

Yesterday Amelia got her first taste of making music (unless you count banging her paci on things). Jason hooked his keyboard up to his computer and when I left for work the two of them were playing together:




(Laura, perhaps Amelia and J will have to "jam" sometime, when you are back in the states)

Amelia was also kind enough to take a short nap, just enough time for Jason and I to eat some breakfast before I left for work:


Last night we went and saw Moon. It was really messed up but really good! We sat in the balcony at work and put Amelia next to the wall up there, so a lot of the sound was blocked. Overall it wasn't that noisy of a movie though, some crashes, but not like Public Enemies was... We try not to take her to too many movies, once in awhile we like to take advantage of free movies though and she sleeps through them. We also want to see Away We Go, and probably will next week. After that, we'll take a break on movies for a few weeks!

busy, busy, busy

As usual, things around here are busy as can be! I have one week left of my first summer school class! I didn't get a chance to blog last night because I was scrambling to write a paper on the My Lai Massacre to turn in this morning... I am looking forward to the remainder of summer school (after this class) because the class I am in lasts 8 weeks, so I only have to go twice a week (vs. 4 times, 4 days a week).

Last night Amelia and I stopped by the Oriental to view part of the screenings for the 48 Hour Film Project. Two of my friends/co-workers worked on one of the films entered, so we went to see it! Luckily their film was second, so we got to leave before the end and Amelia didn't get to bed too late. She behaved very well. We sat up in the balcony and I put her on my lap and she didn't make a single noise!

Amelia's eczema is getting under control. We have 2.5% hydrocortisone that we use on it, once a day usually. We also use a "moisture stick", made by Gerber, that we use frequently. If we slack on using these things her cheeks break out:


Yesterday, when I took this picture, was a better day. her cheeks weren't as red as they sometimes get. You get the idea though I suppose!

When me and Amelia are out and about on our own I have started putting her in a sling. Her in her carseat is too much work for me to lug around, she is a BIG girl! Another plus is that I don't have to try and see around her carseat when I am pushing the cart (when her seat is sitting in the stroller seat, it is inches taller than me, which makes pushing the cart problematic).

My parents get here tomorrow and are staying for the weekend. It will be nice to have some company around for when Jason is at work and Amelia is asleep :)

My most recent observations about tummytime are that she doesn't mind it so much when her front half is propped up:


Amelia's new thing is sucking...on nothing. She did it this evening in front of our neighbor, Ellen, who compared it to someone sucking on a piece of candy (way better description than I have come up with). Here are a couple of pictures of her, sucking:



And lastly, a picture of Ludo. There has been a lack of Ludo pictures/updates on here lately (my mom pointed this out). He is the only cat that really stays out of trouble, therefore, there is usually nothing to report on him! Here he is tonight, stretching:

"Date Night"

Well, we are calling tonight "date night" because I got home from work around 6 (vs the normal of 8 or later on Fridays). Jason gave Amelia her bath and when I got home we ate dinner, ran to Wal-Wart, Dairy Queen and stopped at a Redbox. We rented Paul Blart: Mall Cop ... We both agree that it looks like a 'terrible' movie, but hilarious at the same time...and we both like Kevin James, so we decided that for a dollar to rent it overnight we'd give it a shot! So, tonight it "date night"...ice cream and a movie (plus a sleeping Amelia).

When I got home from work, Jason had just finished giving Amelia her bath and there she was, on the bed, in a full sized towel! I asked why and he told me her towel wasn't hanging in her room (...because we washed it Tuesday), so he grabbed one of ours (which are coincidentally right next to her towels, lol). Here she is using a big girl towel:





Ok, time to start that movie...hopefully it isn't too terrible!

It's the Weekend!

This week has flown by really fast. Tomorrow is already a new week (well, actually today, it is early Sunday already) :)
My sister cam down Thursday and left this evening. Her and Jason spent the day with Amelia yesterday while I was at work. When I got home from work we got a pizza from up the street and I quickly showered because........my sister babysat for us and me and Jason went to see a movie! Funny, I spent 8 hours at work, went home to shower and eat and then there I was, back at the theatre! We went and saw Gomorrah and both enjoyed it.
*if you click on the title of the movie it will bring you to some info about it, in case anyone is interested, it is not a very widely released film :)

I am pretty tired. Much more tired than I thought I was when I started this! I will post some new pictures tomorrow or Monday!