Movin' on...Over?

So, for right now, I've decided to post updates on the Tumblr version of Butter Family Picnic. So if you want hard-hitting news like what Eliot wore on Easter, or what I'm using to brush my teeth, head on over HERE.

Prepare Yourselves

Okay, after some investigating, I think I might be able to make this Tumblr thing work for me. Get ready, we might just be moving...

Welcome Home!

Today little Miss Violet is finally coming home. I can only imagine how grateful and excited her parents must feel today. It’s been a long time coming, little girl. Welcome home.

Shameless Spouse Promotion - Again.

Be there.

Tumb-ling?

I have not abandoned this blog. Well, not completely anyway. I just have not really be feeling it. Maybe it was winter. Maybe it was just 2009. Maybe I'm just a little lazy. Something.

I have been checking out the possibilities at Tumblr, and I'm strongly considering moving the blog over there. I mean, just take a look at what Butter Family Picnic might look like over there. Lovely right? Now I just have to figure out how to move all my old content over there (might not be possible yet) and what the best way would be to help all of you find me in the future.

Anyone have any experience with either of these? Comments welcome!

Modest

Sometime past midnight, Eliot wakes up crying, the result of a bad dream. Ripped out of sleep and confused, I stumble into his room to find him sitting up in bed, crying.

He takes one look at me standing there in a t-shirt and stops crying long enough to say: "Put some clothes on!"

EAT!

If I have to cook one more mother loving fish stick, so help me.

We are in a rut. Eliot's preferred diet consists of the following: Pirate Booty (all flavors), apples, clementines, fruit leathers (all flavors), yogurt, applesauce, carrots, toast with butter or jam, raisins, couscous, occasional cheese, Kashi Honey Sunshine cereal, milk, and fish sticks. So many goddamn fish sticks.

Of course, it's my responsibility as his mother to feed him a proper balanced diet. It's really me that's in the rut, I just kept feeding him things I knew he would eat, not wanting a fight on the food front. But I can take it no more. I've made a little headway by introducing a morning smoothie into the routine that contains fruit, yogurt, milk, and flax seed (if I remember). I'm planning on sneaking some spinach in the mix and telling him it will make him green like the Hulk.

In an attempt to expand his palette, I've been including samples of our dinner on his plate for the past few evenings with very limited success. Actually, it might be more accurate to report these attempts as failures. He takes the most minuscule taste (as in, it touched his tongue for a tenth of a millisecond) of veggie burger or avocado and he will loudly announce with a look of disgust, "I do not like it!"

Sigh.

I really don't want to give him nutrition by sneaking vitamins into brownies or whatever deceptive means being currently recommended by certain celebrity wives. I would really like him to actually acquire a life-long love of eating flavorful, healthy food. But right now, I'm feeling a little desperate.

Moms of picky eaters, help!

Holiday Cheer

Happy New Year

I thought I should try and get one more post in for 2009.

New Year's Eve has always been one of my least favorite holidays. Aside from the plentiful availability of a variety of delicious dips, I could never get over the pressure of having to have the best night ever! and was relieved to find out that as a parent there is absolutely no pressure to have any fun whatsoever ever again.

So we're staying in. Eliot is snuggled in bed (though whether or not he is asleep is uncertain). We have wine and chocolate covered pretzels, which for me qualifies any night for the best night ever. We're going to watch The Hangover and I'm hoping I laugh at least until we have to pause it so I don't literally pee my pants.

For all my friends, family, and readers, I hope that you are all safe and warm and with at least some of those you love tonight. Here's to another year!

Better late than never

I sort of started a tradition of posting photos of Eliot atop a pumpkin at Halloween; that is, I suppose, if you consider doing it twice a tradition. As a result of my unexplainable break from blogging, the tradition has been deferred until now.

So here he is:
And there he was in 2008:


And look at this kid in 2007:



And in case you were curious, he dressed as Frankenstein on the big day:


He actually ended up looking more like just the torso and head of Frankenstein, but he had fun nonetheless. Apparently our neighborhood is the place to trick-or-treat, so we only had to walk a few blocks before his plastic pumpkin was nearly full. He was more interested in the decorations and other kids' costumes than the candy, so we (we? Maybe more like I) helped him out and consumed most of his bounty. In two days. Sometimes being a mother involves a lot of sacrifice.