Sunday, December 22, 2013

The Konnor Effect

Whenever you are pregnant people like to give you advice and tell you about all the fun things you have to look forward to.  Since we had Konnor there have been a lot of fun things, but I may have a new favorite. When we go anywhere with Konnor there are always people who come up to us and tell us how cute he is, or ask how old he is, or what his name is, and they tell us all about their kids and grand kids. It never fails. This happens every single time. Whether we are grocery shopping, at the mall, out to dinner, or anywhere else. I love it. I mean who doesn't love getting told how cute their kid is?!  But that's not the main reason I love it. I love it because it's wonderful to see someone else light up just from seeing Konnor. I love how big they smile when they see him. I love that they like talking to him and making faces at him. And I really do love hearing about all their own kids and grand kids!  It's so nice to hear how proud people are of their own children and grandchildren. Anytime someone comes over to talk to Konnor and me, I try to make sure I don't rush and that we take the time to listen and talk back! Konnor will reach his hand out to people in the store and if we stop by someone he will start babbling like he's carrying on a conversation with them.   It makes their day and mine too. I'm sure a lot of parents experience this and I hope they enjoy it as much as I do! I like to call it the Konnor Effect :). I hope he stays this friendly and chatty and I hope he is still making people smile for years to come!  We love this little guy and I'm so glad he gives me the chance to talk to so many more people when I'm out.


Tuesday, December 3, 2013

Thankful

Every year I really enjoy seeing everyone's daily Thankful posts on Facebook.  I never do it myself on Facebook (not because I'm not thankful) because I know that I would never remember to keep up with it.  I am so forgetful and I'd end up writing something for the first day and then forget about it again until day 10. So I'm just going to post all the things I am thankful for here.  I figured I'd try and do one for every day in November.  I should be able to find 30 things that I am thankful for!  Some will be bigger than others, and some will have longer explanations than others, but here goes my 30 things.

30 Things I am Thankful For...
(in no particular order)

1. Korey and Konnor.  They go together.  I am extremely thankful to have both of them in my life!  I was lucky enough to start dating Korey in high school.  I love that we have been able to spend so many years of our lives together.  It's so fun to be able to say that we have been together for at least half of our lives.  We have gone through so much together, and there is noone else that I want to spend my life with.  Korey is a great father to Konnor.  Every night we do Konnor's bath time together and I love singing fun kid songs with Korey while Konnor looks at us like we are crazy :)  Without Korey there would be no Konnor.  We love Konnor so much.  We've always wanted children and even though it seemd to take longer to have one than we had expected, it was well worth the wait.  Konnor is perfect!  Even when he is awake for 3 hours at night he is perfect :)  Every day he seems to grow right before our eyes.  It's bittersweet.  We love watching him grow, but it's also sad to see him becoming a little boy so fast!  He's walking all over the place and chattering all the time.  He has taught us so much about love, patience, and how to see the world through the eyes of a child again!  We could not be more blessed!

2. Having the opportunity to be a stay at home mom.  I know how lucky I am to be able to stay at home with Konnor.  There are definitely some days where I'm ready for a small break by the end of the day, but I love getting to spend so much time with him.  We've had to sacrifice some things for me to be able to stay at home, but I am so glad we have been able to make it work.

3.  Family.  I love my family.  Even though I'm sad we don't live in Charleston anymore, it has been nice to be able to see family more often.  We have been able to see our parents, siblings and grandparents a lot more frequently since we have moved closer.  It's nice that Konnor has also gotten the chance to see his grandparents, aunt, uncle, and great grandparents more frequently too :)  We also appreciate that they come down to visit us just as much as we go up to see them.  I'm also always happy when we get the chance to see other family members too!

4.  Bella and Chloe- Our furry family members.  We got Bella almost immediately after we got married.  I wanted a dog growing up, but was never able to have one.  As soon as we got married, getting a dog was one of the first things we did.  Bella can be a little ornary at times, but we love her.  We got Chloe a couple years later and I'm so glad we did.  I love having two dogs and Chloe is the best friend to Konnor.  She will let him crawl over, under, and all around her without moving.  She likes when he throws the ball to her, and you can always find her laying beside him in the living room.

5.  Friends.  We are very lucky to have some pretty awesome friends.  We have had to move so many times in the past few years, and we have always managed to make some great friends wherever we have lived.  We have kept in touch with so many people, and we try to visit friends as often as we can, and we love when they come to visit us.  Friends are so important, and I'm glad that we have had the opportunity to make so many different friends the past couple years.  I'm sure we will make even more and we will always be thankful for the ones we have.

6.  Facebook.  Yes, I am thankful for Facebook. :)  Facebook has made it super easy to keep in touch with all the friends we have made.  There have been times where we have moved away from somewhere, and then gone back to live, or just to visit, and it feels like we never left because we have been able to keep up with our friends lives through facebook.  It's nice to share pictures with friends, and be able to get on and send a quick message.

7.  Charleston.   I know that we don't live there anymore, but I'm just happy we had the opportunity to live there twice.  I will find a way to get back there again someday.  Hopefully sooner rather than later.  I miss Charleston every day, but just knowing that I have found a place I truly love makes me happy.  We always are talking about going back there to live some day so that gives me something to look forward to.  Until then, we will just have to visit when we can!

8.  Our house.  I am so happy that we finally actually own the house we are living in.  After moving around so much and renting places from lots of different people, it's nice to know that we are homeowners now.  I'm looking forward to painting more room, hanging pictures, and making it our own.

9.  A handy husband!  I'm so glad that Korey likes trying to fix things, and he likes knowing how things work.  It definitely comes in handy!  He childproofed the house for Konnor, he changes are car oil, and with the help of the neighbor he moved our pellet stove upstairs so we could have lots of heat this winter without paying a million dollars for propane!  He does so many other things and I am thankful for him!

10.  Chloe + Isabel.  I recently started selling Chloe + Isabel jewelry and I love it!!  I've been looking for something to do to earn a little extra money and this is perfect.  I love the jewelry and I love how supportive the whole community is.  I don't feel pressure to sell anything, and I can do it on my own time.  It's given me something to do for myself during the day, and I love sharing all the fun jewelry they have with everyone! www.chloeandisabel/boutique/kristyw

11.  Running.  I took a long break from running recently, which I of course regret.  Each time I take a break from running, its so hard to get back into it.  I just yesterday ran again for the first time in about 3 months!  What was I thinking?? 3 months?? It wasn't a super long run, but it felt good to actually  make myself get out there and do it.  There are a lot of days that I feel like crap when I'm running and I ask myself why I am doing it.  But there are also days where I'm running and I love it and I tell myself that I could just keep running forever.  I love signing up for races and training for them.  I love the great feeling of accomplishment when I complete a race!  I still have a goal to some day run a half marathon in all 50 states, but I need to start running again more consistently if I ever want to reach that goal!

12. Konnor's mess he leaves all over the living room floor.  I know this is a weird thing to be thankful for, but I am.  Every time I see that mess it reminds me that we have a healthy and happy little boy.  It also reminds me that Korey is a wonderful father, who pushes down his own desire to have a clean, perfect, organized living room, in order to let his son have a fun, happy, toy throwing day :)  We do however at least pick most of the toys up at the end of the day and throw them in the pack'n play where they wait for Konnor to throw them all back out in the morning while he waits for his breakfast!

13.  My health.  I am thankful every day that I am healthy.  I rarely get sick and I don't have any major health issues.  I hope that I can stay healthy throughout my life.

14. Cooking.  Now that we live in a small town again and there aren't as many restaurants and fast food places nearby we have been cooking a lot more.  I don't always love cooking, but it has been fun looking up recipes and finding new meals to try cooking.  Korey and I both take turns cooking, and we also cook together.  We've been eating out a lot less which is great because it's healthier and it saves money!

15.  Our Local Library.  I love going to the library.  I have loved going to the library since I was a little kid.  I have my parents to thank for that.  I remember going to the library when I was little and picking out books for them to read to me.  They were always reading as we were growing up, and so because of that I love reading now.  We read to Konnor before bed every night and I try and read to him a couple times a week during the day also.  Konnor and I go to the library at least once a week to pick out new books to read to him, and books that I can read for myself.  Our library also has programs for babies and toddlers.  We signed Konnor up for the first session and he loved it.  We will be signing him up again in February!

16.  Holidays.  During holidays we usually get to see family and everyone is in a happier mood!  It doesn't matter what holiday it is, although I do enjoy Thanksgiving and Christmas the most!

17.  Vacations!  Going on vacations even if they are a small weekend trip somewhere is something that is important to us.  I am so thankful that Korey loves to travel as much as I do, and that we find ways to save the money and make these vacations happen.  Even if it means that it takes a couple years to save up to make some of the bigger trips happen.  There are so many places I want to go some day.  I hope that we are always able to travel and that we get to take Konnor on lots of vacations big and small!

18.  Coffee.  I resisted being a coffee drinker for a long time.  I know it's probably not the most healthy habit to have, but it sure does help after those long nights when Konnor is up for 3 hours or more!

19.  This blog.  I started this blog over a year ago after we found out I was pregnant.  We didn't want to tell too many people right away and so we created this blog to share with our close friends and family who knew.  Now I just enjoy having the blog to write what I want, share pictures of Konnor, and to still let family and friends know what is going on in our lives.  Hopefully some day I'll go back and read all these posts and be able to remember all the great times we've had!

20.  Other Moms.  My mom, my mother-in-law, friends that are moms, and moms I don't even know!  It's always nice to have other moms around so you can ask them questions, talk about kid things, and give some advice of your own.  I know I'm a better mom because I have so many other mothers to look up to and to ask for advice when I need it!

21.  Konnor's love for music.  He loves all kinds of music.  This means I can play anything I want in the car and he is usually pretty happy with it.  His favorite songs aren't "wheels on the bus" or "twinkle twinkle" (although he does enjoy those), but instead they are "Home" by Phillip Phillips and the "Cup Song".  He's loved the "Home" song ever since he was little.  When he would scream in his car seat all we had to do was put this song on and he would settle down most days.  Even now when he gets a little cranky all we have to do is turn this song on and it usually does the trick.

22.  Lazy weekend days.  It's so nice some weekends to just sit around and not do much except play with Konnor and the dogs, watch movies, read a book and nap. :)

23.  Sweatpants!  They are super comfy and now that I am at home most of the day I wear them ALL the time!  I'm sure Korey is getting sick of seeing me in sweatpants! (Sorry Korey).  

24.  Laughter.  I love hearing Konnor's laugh.  I also love seeing other people laugh because of Konnor.  Everyone who meets Konnor loves him.  He's almost always happy and his laugh is contagious!  Korey and I definitely smile and laugh a lot more now that he is around!

25.  Books.  I enjoy reading and always have.  I love finding a good book and letting myself get lost in the story.  I hope that Konnor enjoys reading some day as much as I do!

26. Movies.  Korey and I have always had fun going to see movies together.  Now that we have Konnor we don't get to go to see movies as often as we used to.  We still like to rent movies though, and we also like watch movies that we own, and occasionally we are lucky and get to go see a movie in the theater.

27.  My Smartphone.  I like how easy it is to take a picture, look something up, call someone, and so much more.  When I was up all hours of the night feeding Konnor, I loved having my phone to read a book, or look up answers to the million questions I had about babies.  Now I use my phone almost every day to take pictures of Konnor.  It's so nice to always have a camera with me!

28.  Warm Weather.  It's not warm right now, but when it is warm it makes me very happy.  I love Summer and sunshine.  I like going to the beach and being outside all day in the warm sun.  I enjoy running when its nice out, and going for walks with Konnor.  I can't wait until the summertime and I hope that we get to live somewhere close to the beach again some day!

29. Sleep!  I love to sleep :)  I don't get as much sleep as I used to, but I get plenty.  I probably got more sleep than I needed before!  There are also nights that I get very little sleep depending on if Konnor is up a lot.  I am very thankful though for the nights I can fall asleep quick and get a full night of uninterrupted sleep. But honestly.... those nights I get to be up with Konnor for a few extra hours aren't always so bad. (It just stinks when they happen several nights in a row!)

30. YOU.  Whoever you are reading this right now, I am thankful for YOU!  I'm glad that people actually take the time to read what I have to write.  Even if it is pointless and boring sometimes.  So Thank you!

Well there's 30 things I am thankful for!  Hopefully you were able to make it through all 30!  I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving and I hope you take the time to think about all that you are Thankful for right now in your life!





Tuesday, November 26, 2013

Random Time

Wow... I didn't realize it had been about two weeks since I last posted anything!  I guess we haven't done anything very interesting to write about :)  Since I just have a bunch of different thoughts, I figured I'd do another random post!
First off I started selling Chloe + Isabel jewelry.  A friend of ours started selling the jewelry and when she was here visiting she brought some to show me!  I loved all of it, and everything else she told me about the company!  For the past few months I have been considering becoming a merchandiser for a direct sales company but wasn't sure what company I wanted to work with.  I started researching a bunch of different ones to see what their requirements were, what incentives they had, how much profit you make, what they charged, and so on.  Chloe + Isabel just seemed like the best fit.  They have a great product and everyone I've talked to with the company has been super helpful!  I don't have any requirements I have to meet, but there are incentives if I sell a certain amount each month if I want to try and earn them.  I don't have to pay anything after the initial kit I bought, which is great since some of the companies I looked into started eventually charging you to have a website.  The only downfall I have seen so far, is that I like so much of the jewelry it's going to be hard to not spend all the money I earn buying jewelry! :)  If you want to go check out any of the jewelry Chloe + Isabel has just go to my site here.
 

Next up is Konnor's crazy sleeping (or I should say lack of sleeping).  For the past 5 nights Konnor has been waking up and staying awake for at least 3 hours, and one night he was up for 4 hours.  I have no idea why he is waking up.  Most of the nights he wakes up crying but is okay once we pick him up.  Some nights though he is cranky the whole time he is awake and seems uncomfortable.  So many things have changed for him lately, so I have no idea what is causing this.  He has started walking.  He walks all over the place without our help and is pretty good at it! He also is getting at least one tooth that we can see, but he doesn't let us look long enough to tell if there are more coming in.  On top of all that, he also switched to whole milk when he turned one.  So I don't know if any of these things are messing up his sleep, or if its something else entirely.  I've given up trying to guess.  We have a doctors appointment today (unfortunately it's for another shot) and I plan to ask them what they think might be causing it.  I just don't know what to do when he is awake.  Three hours is such a long time!  I try rocking him, but he either just lays there and still stays awake or he cries and arches his back and acts uncomfortable.  The same thing happens if I try and hold him and bounce or walk around.  The past two nights I've eventually brought him downstairs and let him walk around and eventually he gets tired again.  Luckily the past two nights we have put him to sleep early and he's woken up by 10 and then is back asleep by 1 or 2 and sleeps until 9 so I've been getting some sleep.  Konnor however is still not getting the amount of sleep he should.  During the day he acts normal.  He doesn't fuss and he takes great naps.  Hopefully this phase will eventually stop, or we will figure out what is causing it.  I don't see it getting better any time soon though since he gets another shot today and then we head home to family for the weekend.  He never sleeps well when we go home.  Korey has been helping as much as he can, but during the week I try and let him sleep since he has to go to work and I can always take a nap the next day.  During the weekend though we were both up most of the night!

Thanksgiving!  We are so happy to get to spend Thanksgiving with family.  We will get to eat a ton of food, and we get to also celebrate Konnor's birthday again with our family.  The trip should be interesting.  As usual we will have to pack the car full with all of our stuff, Konnor's stuff  and the dogs and their stuff.  Lots of "stuff"!! :) Then when we come back home we will have even more because I'm sure Konnor will get some birthday presents!!  Luckily Korey is a wonderful packer and always manages to fit everything in!  The other part of the trip that could be interesting is the crappy weather.  We are only supposed to have rain here, but for some of our trip there will most likely be snow.  I am not a fan of snow and I really hate driving in it.  I'm kind of bummed there will be snow.  Korey is of course very excited for the snow.  I wouldn't mind it for Christmas, but I'd prefer a nice, warm, snow-free Thanksgiving.  Oh well.  Konnor is going to need some warmer clothes and some boots, and gloves!

Christmas presents are next.  I had a hard enough time trying to figure out what to get Konnor for his birthday and now we have to turn around and figure out what to get him for Christmas!  We've purchased a few things already, but there are a couple more things we want to get him. I'm hoping he has more fun opening Christmas presents than he did his Birthday presents!  He didn't seem interested at all in unwrapping his presents.  He enjoyed playing with them when they were open, but I thought he would've had more fun ripping off the wrapping paper.  Oh well :) 


The toys on the top row we have already purchased.  I LOVE the superhero plush toys.  We purchased Captain America and plan to at least get Spiderman too (since he's Korey's favorite) but we added ALL of them to our Konnor wishlist on Amazon so we remember to get them when we need other presents for him :)  We also got the Batman and Joker Little People.  He likes the Little People he has now, so we figured we'd add a few more fun ones! We decided to get him the keys because he always wants to hold ours, and then he proceeds to chew them.  We figured it would be better if he had his own set to chew on safely!  We're hoping to get him a couple books and the alphabet blocks at least, and maybe a few more gifts. It's definitely fun looking through toys and trying to decide what Konnor might like, but I think it will be a little easier next year when he can start telling us and showing us what he is interested in!

Well I think that's all the random thoughts I have for now.  Hope everyone has a wonderful Thanksgiving!

Monday, November 11, 2013

Konnor's First Birthday

I know I've said it already a million times, but how has it been a year already??  I'm not going to lie though, even though we have loved Konnor right from the start, the age he is at right now is probably the most fun so far.  I love watching him walk (and fall down) around the living room.  It's so fun to see how excited he gets when he realizes he is walking.  Usually his excitement makes him walk even crazier though and he ends up falling down!  He's also started "talking" a little.  He likes to say "all done".  It sounds a little more like "ahh done" and I'm pretty sure he has no idea what he means when he is saying it haha.  He is definitely trying to repeat what we say to him a lot more now.  I love when he walks over to us and babbles something and then just walks off again!

We were super lucky to have some friends come visit for the weekend to help celebrate Konnor's First Birthday with us!  They got here on Friday night and it was so nice to have them here!  It felt just like old times!  We've moved several times in the last 7 years and it's great to know that we have such great friends in so many of the places that we have lived.  It's always wonderful when friends come to visit!  On Saturday we hung out in the morning and then we went for a nice walk to a lighthouse and had a picnic lunch that consisted of some sandwiches from Subway that we ate at a park :)  The park had a small zipline for kids and of course everyone had to try it out.  Except for me unfortunately.  I was already wearing Konnor in our Ergo baby carrier.

It was a little chilly, but the walk was beautiful and it was nice to just be spending time hanging out with our friends.  "Uncle" Max even carried Konnor in the carrier for the whole walk (which made me extra happy when we were going uphill near the end of the walk)!










After our walk we came back to the house to celebrate Konnor's Birthday!  Before we ate, we let Konnor open his presents.  I thought he would be more excited about tearing the wrapping paper off than he actually was.  He didn't really seem to know what he was supposed to do.  We helped him unwrap his gifts and he loved everything.  He got some pretty cool gifts from Max, Sami and Jami.  He's a lucky little boy, and we are extremely lucky to have such great friends!  Korey made his delicious meatloaf for dinner and we also made Konnor a cake!  He LOVED his cake.  Korey did not want Konnor to have any cake before his first birthday, so this was the first time he had ever had any.  We gave him a piece and he dug right in!  There of course was cake EVERYWHERE :)


Before Picture...


During the Cake Eating....








All Done??

Of course he had to share some with his best friend Chloe...


And then this is what happens when the cake is all gone...

It's his party...he can cry if he wants to
 Don't feel too bad for him though because he will get another birthday party with family that will involve more cake when we go home for Thanksgiving

Overall it was a great weekend and a wonderful first birthday for Konnor!  Thank you to everyone who sent Happy Birthday wishes and gifts! 

Thursday, November 7, 2013

Birthday and Gifts

I can't believe that Konnor will have his first birthday this Sunday, November 10th!!  It's so crazy to think that a year has gone by already.  I remember during the first few months (when I was sleep deprived, and he wouldn't take a bottle, and we were trying to figure out where we were going to move to next) that this day would never get here.  Now that it's here, it seems like the time just flew by!

As far as birthday parties go, I didn't know what to do for his first one.  I know some people have big parties and invite all their friends and family and their kids "baby friends", but we don't really know anyone here and since Konnor stays at home with me we don't really know any other kids his age that live near us.  So we decided on a low key birthday this year since he won't really remember it anyhow, and he won't care what kind of birthday he has because he won't really even know what is going on!  Luckily for us we have some GREAT friends from Maine/New Hampshire coming this weekend for a visit so they will get to join us for our first little mini birthday party for Konnor.  We're going to have a cake and some presents for him at home and just celebrate with us and our friends that are visiting.  When we go home for Thanksgiving we are going to have another birthday party for him with all our family.  Sometimes I feel like maybe I'm a bad mom for not having some big first birthday party for him, but I think this is the best way to do it for us.  Hopefully next year we will know some more people, and Konnor will have some little friends that we can invite to share the day with him.  Also we figure next year he will have more things he is interested in, and he'll be more aware of what is going on! 
Along with figuring out what to do for his birthday, I also had a hard time trying to decide what to get him.  He spends most of his days now trying to walk, throwing blocks and cars around the room, napping, and going on walks or trips with me!  He doesn't really need a ton of toys or anything, but he could definitely use a few new things to entertain him.  We ended up buying him the second Little Blue Truck book called Little Blue Truck Leads the Way.  I've mentioned it before in previous posts.  He loves his Little Blue Truck book so hopefully he likes the new one too!  We also got him some blue truck pj's to go along with the book! We got him some new bath toys since he LOVES bath time, and we also got him this Elefun busy ball popper toy.  Hopefully in the future he just looks back at pictures of his first birthday and knows that he is loved by us and lots of other people!





Friday, November 1, 2013

Konnor's First Halloween

Konnor was born 10 days after Halloween so this was his first Halloween!!  He wore a Tigger costume and I think he actually enjoyed wearing it!  He never fussed when we put it on him.  The only part he didn't love was the hood.  The costume worked out great though.  Everyone thought he was super cute, and it kept him warm while we sat outside on our porch and handed out candy!


Growing up I loved going trick or treating and I'm sure I probably went for a couple years past what I should have :)  Korey and I have lived several places over the past few years so we've had a lot of different Halloween experiences.  When we moved to Charleston for the first time, we lived in an apartment complex.  They gave us a sign to hang on the door if we wanted to hand out candy.  I was super excited because this was the first year we would get to hand out candy from our own place.  We hung the sign on the door, and sadly we had no trick or treaters.  What a bummer.  To top it all off, our dog Bella ate quite a bit of the candy (wrappers and all) the next day while we were at work.  We of course were then worried because she had ate a ton of chocolate, but she was fine.  When we lived in Maine we went out with our friends on Halloween so we didn't hand out any candy that I can remember.  Instead this is what happened...
This picture makes me laugh every time I see it.  I have no idea what I was doing/saying, and Korey's look is priceless haha. 
After Portsmouth, we lived in Charleston again for two years.  The first year Korey had to work on Halloween and I didn't want to have to deal with the dogs every time the doorbell rang so I just left the candy outside.  Surprisingly there was still candy in the bowl at the end of the night.  The second year Korey was home so one of us held back the dogs whenever the doorbell rang, and the other handed out candy.  This year though was by far the craziest/best year as far as trick or treating goes.  When we bought the house, the previous owners warned us that there would be a lot of trick or treaters but I was still not prepared.  We ran out of candy within the first 30 minutes and I had to run out and go get some more.  We still did not have very much left at the end of the night.  There are a lot of kids in our neighborhood, but there were a TON of people that also drove their kids to our neighborhood.  We had fun sitting outside with Konnor and handing out candy to everyone.  Konnor loved being outside and watching all the kids come up to the porch.  He also got to enjoy his first lollipop.  He LOVED it of course.  He was not very happy when I took it away about half way through.


   
                                   


Also to prepare for Halloween we bought Konnor two new Halloween books.  We love reading to Konnor and we read him some books every night before bed.  We bought Goodnight Goon and Dracula.  Goodnight Goon is a parody on Goodnight Moon and Dracula is a kids version counting book based on the real Dracula story.  We enjoyed both books. 

At the end of the night, Konnor decided to give us our own Halloween treat and he slept through the night for the first time in almost 3 weeks!!  Between starting to walk and teething, he has been a terrible sleeper.  I was so happy to wake up this morning and realize that I had gotten a full nights sleep! :)  Thank you Konnor!


So now that Halloween is over is it okay to start watching Christmas movies and listening to Christmas songs already?! :)

Wednesday, October 23, 2013

Just another random post


I had a lot of random things to write about but none of them were really long enough to fill one post so I figured I'd just combine some stuff into one random (probably rambling) post!
First off is my trip to NYC last weekend with Courtney. I love going on sister trips and it seems like it had been awhile since we had gone on one. When Courtney asked me if she could take me to NYC as my Christmas/Birthdy gift of course I said YES!!!  I was surprised at how easy it was for us to get to the city from our house. It took us only a little over 2 hours to get to NJ and then we had an 8 minute ferry ride and we were there!


We did A LOT of walking and both our phones died but it was all worth it. We went to see First Date. It was a great broadway musical. It was hilarious and the acting and singing were great. I would love to go see it again. If anyone is going to NYC anytime soon it is definitely worth checking out. After the show we accidentally ended up in the waiting area for meeting the cast and we got autographs and Zachary Levi the male lead in the show stayed and made sure he signed everyone's playbill and took pictures with everyone. 
Konnor and Korey had a great "guys day" back at home!
Second random thought is about an app I use on my phone called Viggle. It's free and I got it sometime at the beginning of the year. I kind of forgot about it for awhile and then started using it again recently. It is great!  Basically you check in to tv shows and get points for watching tv. You get one point for each minute and there are a ton of bonus points you can earn for checking in to popular shows that are on most nights. You can redeem your points for gift cards ,merchandise, and more. So far I've gotten $50 worth of Lowes gift cards which we've used some of to buy paint to fix up the house. It can take awhile to earn enough points but if you remember to check in to shows and you're smart about it, you can earn points fairly quickly also. 
Another thing I've been thinking about iswhat  to get Konnor for his birthday and for Christmas. I feel like we need to get him some new interactive toys. Right now he has a lot of trucks, tractors, cars, etc that he likes to push and throw across the floor. I think he needs some other toys though so if anyone has any suggestions for a one year old boy we are happy to hear them. 
We also had some visitors from Charleston recently. Our friends Ciara and Elliot stopped by and Korey took the day off so we could hang out with them. It was great seeing them again. We miss all our friends we've made in our travels and we are always happy when anyone comes to visit!  We spent the day going to a corn maze, having lunch outside, getting pumpkin spice lattes and ice cream and playing settlers of catan. It was fun!

I'm sure there are more random things I could write about but I think that's all for now!

Monday, October 14, 2013

First Solo Trip with Konnor

This weekend Konnor and I went home to visit for a "long weekend".  Korey had to work so we left him behind.  This was the first time Konnor and I went on a trip together without Korey.  Konnor was an awesome traveler!  Our ride is about 4 1/2 hours long and he didn't fuss at all on the way there.  He took two naps and the rest of the time he looked out the windows and played with some toys or "talked" to me.  We stopped at Starbucks of course for a Pumpkin Spice Latte and since it was the 10th anniversary of the PSL, I got a free pumpkin cookie and they decorated my cup!  It was a nice surprise!












We had a busy weekend visiting people!  Friday we went for a long walk with Aunt Courtney and visited with both sets of Grandparents.  On Saturday morning we ran some errands and did some shopping with Grandma Witt.  We also visited with Uncle Kody.  In the afternoon, after Konnor took a loooonnnng nap, we visited with his Great Aunt Jean and Uncle Don.  Then we went with Grandma Kelso to a fall festival to see Sarah, Tom, Benny and Lucy and to play with some pumpkins and corn! :)


Konnor had a great time in the corn, and he (surprisingly) sat still for a bunch of pictures with pumpkins and scarecrows and other fall things!  When we left the festival we still were not done with our visiting for the day.  Our next stop was a brief stop at a birthday party, and then we went to see Great Grandma Nazimiec, Great Uncle Steve and Aunt Paula, and Great Uncle Mike (we saw all of them in one visit)!  I think Konnor was definitely ready for bed that night!



Sunday we went with Grandma Kelso and Aunt Courtney to Christmas in the Woods.  It was a fun craft fair in the woods in Ohio.  We didn't buy much, but we had fun walking around and looking at all the different vendors.  Later that night Konnor and I went to visit Grandma and Grandpa Witt again and then we went back to Grandma and Grandpa Kelso's so we could get a good nights sleep before we had to wake up and head back home!
Konnor did great again on the ride home.  We came home to find a nice clean house, and some new fall decorations throughout the house!  It was WONDERFUL coming home to a house that was clean, dishes were washed, laundry was done, and all I had to do was relax.  THANK YOU KOREY! :) Maybe I should go away more often?

On another fun note... 





... Konnor definitely looks like Korey!! :)

Tuesday, October 8, 2013

Weekend Fun and Halloween Movies

We had some visitors this past weekend! We love visitors!  Aunt Courtney and Matt came to hang out with us for the weekend. Friday night we went to Kilby's for some ice cream. Unfortunately they didn't have any pumpkin ice cream Booooo. Konnor enjoyed swinging, checking out the animals, and of course sampling everyone's ice cream!
We all went to bed early Friday night. Everyone was pretty tired. 
Saturday we went apple picking!  I had never been apple picking before (at least not that I can remember anyway). It was a lot of fun. It would have been a little better if it had felt like Fall and wasn't 85 degrees but it was still a great time!  We picked a bunch of apples and we even ate a couple while we picked. They are all seriously the most delicious apples EVER!!  I want to go back again and get even more!!  Even Courtney who is allergic to apples texted me and said she has been eating them and she loves them!

After apple picking, we went to try out a restaurant in Newark. We had some yummy pizza and then stopped for some pumpkin spice Starbucks drinks for "dessert".  That evening we played Settlers of Catan and Scribblish. Two games Korey and I don't get to play often because you need more than 2 players. Then when Konnor went to bed we made a fire and sat around making some s'mores. It was a perfect Saturday!  

Tonight Korey and I started our Halloween movie watching. Last year in the middle of October we decided to try and watch one scary movie a night until Halloween. This year we decided to start a little early and since we have a lot going on in October there will probably be several nights we have to skip. I also am trying to pick Halloween movies that aren't super scary. I don't know if it's the fact that we have our own house now or that we have a child, but I just don't think I could handle super scary movies. They always used to freak me out but even previews now will creep me out when I'm up at night alone with Konnor or if I'm the last one going up to bed and turning all the lights off as I go. Either way, since I'm easily scared now we decided to watch Ghostbusters as our first movie. I love watching older movies that we haven't seen in awhile. 
Hope everyone had a great weekend like we did and hopefully you are all enjoying your own Fall/Halloween movies!!