Vacation

Well more of a “staycation”…

For awhile now, I have known that Aedan’s sitter was going to be on out of town for the first week of August. I made sure not to plan on seeing clients for the week since I would need to be home with Aedan.

As the time came closer, I decided I should just take the week off for a staycation of sorts. It has been a busy summer and a very busy last month when it comes to work. I thought this would be a good chance to take a break before the school year starts up again.

Once I decided to take the week off, Jon decided he could take the week off also. He has lots of vacation time this year and has not touched it at all.

We are both excited to have the time off! We went out to breakfast this morning and were talking about how nice it is that we don’t have to work tomorrow.

We have some fun things planned for the week, including heading down to New Braunfels for a few days to hang out with Jon’s parents and spending some time with my sister and parents later in the week.

I know this week off is going to fly by but for now I am going to relax and enjoy the fact that we are on vacation staycation.

-Lauren-

Bringing the Bouncy Chair Back

Yesterday, when I picked Aedan up at the sitter’s house, she opened the door and said I had to come see where he was hanging out. I walked across the room and found him lounging in a bouncy seat. Yes, my 25lb 16 month old hanging out in a seat made for a little baby. He looked ridiculous! I wish I had had my phone with me and had a picture of it. The bouncy seat was practically laying flat with him in it. The sitter said he kept going over and getting in all morning. Silly boy!

When we got home I told Jon about it and he decided to go get Aedan’s old bouncy seat out of the garage. When Aedan woke up from his nap, he was pretty excited and decided he needed to have snack in his “new chair”.

He has grown up a lot!!

He spend the afternoon crawling in and out of the seat and bouncing on it like it was a trampoline.

-Lauren-

Spending Diet–Update

So we have been at this little spending diet for 13 days (only 2 days to go). I have to be honest, we have cheated a time or two three. BUT I have not been to Target once in the last 13 days, which is pretty huge. I tend to get bored during the day and just go to Target. I usually never leave empty handed so while I don’t spend too much at each trip, the total adds up quickly.

So where have we cheated?

Well last Wednesday Jon found out he was going to have to go to LA to help with a Dell commercial over the weekend (it’s not for TV, but he totally got to be in it! If we get a copy of the commercial, I’ll post it!). So on Thursday night we decided to get veggie burgers from P.Terrys. BUT I had taken our jar of coins to the grocery store and got cash so we used that money (I will also be using some of that cash when I go to girl’s night tonight, yay for margaritas and girl chat!!). So it was kind of cheating and kind of not, right?

Then I totally found the perfect jacket online at Old Navy and it was on sale (no doubt due to the warm hot front that seems to be everywhere). I have been looking for a jacket like this for awhile now and I just knew it would be sold out if I waited to buy it. So I cashed in our Discover points for an Old Navy gift card and ordered it. It came yesterday and I love it. Too bad it is going to be like 4 months before it will actually be cold enough for me to wear it!

 

 

Cheat number three is all on Jon, but it was for me so I am not complaining. I was a little jealous that he got to go to LA for the weekend and I had to stay home. He did have to work, but he had all day Saturday to explore and he kept telling me about all the stores and restaurants he could walk to from his hotel. Lame. So I had mentioned awhile back that I wanted to get this wallet from Vera Bradley. It is just like my beloved fossil wallet that I used for years (I even bought a second one and used that for a long time, but sadly the zippers broke on both of them). Well when Jon got back on Sunday, he causally left a shopping back on the table. It was from a bookstore so I figured he had picked up a book for his trip back. But it was the wallet I have been wanting! I was super surprised. :)

And I guess I should admit I have used my business credit card at Starbucks a couple of times over the last two week when I was working or doing interviews. BUT since that is work, I don’t think it counts. :)

Now with only 2 days left, we are already planning another spending diet for the last part of August and who knows maybe I will hold off on going to Target for a whole month.

-Lauren-

The Many Faces of Aedan

On Friday Aedan and I stayed home all day. It was really nice to not have anywhere to go, especially since it was 105 outside! We spent the day playing, cuddling and taking it easy. I played with my camera and got these funny shots.

This first one is the reaction I got when he noticed I was taking his picture. He gives me this look a lot; whenever he is trying to tell me something really important. Can we say extrovert! Goodness!

This next one is the look I got when I told him to “say cheese” and modeled a fake smile. Nice right?

Haha! Apparently this is what I look like when I fake smile.

-Lauren-

Instagram

I jumped on the Instagram bandwagon. It makes taking pictures with my iphone so fun!

Check out this little guy’s new trick. Good grief!

-Lauren-

Snack Time

I took these pictures awhile ago with my new camera. I’ve been slacking on getting the pictures onto my computer lately. First I couldn’t find the cord I needed. Then Jon changed the way we are storing/backing up all of our documents and pictures and I couldn’t get Lightroom to recognize where all the pictures were.. Jon finally fixed that for me, so now I should be good to go. :)

Anyway. Aedan usually have a snack after his afternoon nap. Sometimes he eats at the table, sometimes outside and sometimes I give him his snack in a snack cup and let him pick were he eats (his favorite). Most of the time he takes his drink and snack and sits on the tile in our entry way. After a few minutes he gets up and attempts to share his snack with his best friend…

Hiro didn’t mind at all, he has decided that veggie straws are pretty good too.

-Lauren-

p.s. these pictures are really grainy. I had my iso up high because it was cloudy outside and dark inside, Aedan moves fast and I am still exploring with my new camera. :)

Spending Diet

Jon and I have decided to try a little spending diet. We started yesterday and for the next two weeks we are only spending money on gas and groceries. Nothing else (well nothing other than our bills of course). I don’t think it will be too hard except it means no shopping here for me…

Target is my weakness. It also means no eating out, which is something we tend to do a lot on the weekends. Today we went to Costco and the grocery store to stock up. Jon made some homemade black bean burgers for dinner and they were delicious. So far so good. :)

I think this two week spending diet will be good for us. It will force us to find other things to do on the weekends besides shopping or eating out and stop me from going to Target when I really don’t need a thing.

We decided we would see how it goes and maybe even try to do it for the whole month of September (We have a mini vacation planned for August so we know we will be eating out and such then).

On a completely different topic, I watched this documentary yesterday. It was really good and totally made me want to go buy a juicer and try it for myself. BUT that would defeat the whole spending diet so I changed my mind. Plus we don’t eat very much meat in the first place. I probably cook chicken maybe once a week/two weeks and I don’t cook red meat at all. I do think I am going to try and make one of these smoothies tomorrow. I’ll let you know what I think. Definitely check out the movie too!

-Lauren-