oh boy

so, if you haven't noticed, there's been a lot of basketball on tv lately. we normally don't have the tv on while cash is awake but did have it on for march madness. i would be remiss and get made fun of by my husband if i didn't go ahead and admit right now that i don't care about basketball or football or any sports really other than having it on for noise. ok...back to the purpose of this post.

cash l-o-v-e-s basketball. any time we go to the park where there is a rec center for kid basketball and an adult court outside all he wants to do is watch the people playing basketball. he doesn't care about the swing or slide too much. he wants to watch basketball and play with a basketball.
his favorite word is "ball."

he has his own basketball hoop - three in fact - one in the tub, a smallish one hanging on a cabinet and a big plastic one that will grow with him that we can keep indoors or out.

he has ball decals on his wall and the first thing he says in the morning is "ball" while pointing to them.

when he was just a day old in this picture:



jason was concerned that his arms were too long for his body but then we thought, wow, i guess he'll just make a great basketball player!

i think you get the picture but again, back to the point of this post.

last night cash brought me the tv remote (not the one we lost although we did find that one!) and kept saying "ball, ball." i thought he just wanted to play ball so i put down the remote and "dribbled" one of his many balls to his hoop like normal, slammed it into the hoop and celebrated like we always do. he went straight for the remote and again said "ball ball." after about a minute i realized he wanted me find basketball on the tv for him to watch! so i did and luckily the ncaa women's final game was on. he was happy.

this morning jason is home with him because he had a fever yesterday and he called me while i was driving to work and said that cash has been crying and pointing at the tv saying "ball, ball" for the last 15 minutes. so he found a basketball documentary on for him to watch. we plan to record some basketball to have on the dvr.

oh boy.

the best $5.00 i've ever spent

last summer when cashel and i were at mimi and papa's house in kernersville i forked over 5 bucks to target for a baby swimming pool. you've seen it before on a previous post. i call it "the best $5.00 i've ever spent." seriously, the best $5.00 i've e-v-e-r spent. 10 months after its purchase cashel still plays with it. it mostly stays in front of a stone wall that jason and i are afraid he will impale himself on for two reasons, 1) he's only 17 months old and he although he is a professional walker he is still quite wobbly at times and falls down and, 2) jason impaled himself on said stones (i wrote a post about that too some time ago).

here is a video taken of cash that's about 2 or 3 weeks old. he was having one of those days where his emotions were getting the best of him in split seconds. just watch and you'll see what i mean. but while it's still uploading i'll go ahead and mention a couple of things. cashel loves to be covered up and walk around. he loves to have a blanket tossed on top of him and walk around. yes, i'm a little afraid he'll run into corners of things so i watch for that. he loves the parachute they occasionally play with at day care. he loves to wiggle underneath a blanket with me or jason while we kick up the blanket with our legs. he loves his tunnel and his tent and i found him earlier today crawling into a paper grocery bag. i'm considering having him be a ghost for halloween this year - i think he'll like it.

my favorite things

as you might imagine these are all cashel related...

1. play ring around the rosy with me and/or jason and 'dropping' whenever he pleases

2. for some reason we can't figure out any time...and i mean anytime...we can be indoors or out...if a helicopter or airplane flies overhead cash stops whatever he is doing, puts one of his arms up to 'wave' and says 'bye byes'

3. his favorite word these days is 'up'...even when jason or i put him to bed...if he's not quite ready to be left alone he'll say 'up' and we have to pick him up to cuddle a bit more

4. cuddling a bit more before putting him to bed

5. he's had an explosion of words lately...he says his own name and the names of his friends at school including his teacher's name...in his own 'speak' of course: 'augie'(for his friend august who everyone calls auggie), 'tricia' (for his teacher miss patricia), 'annie' (self explanitory)...we're working on charlie, charlotte, brenden and henry. he says 'jason'...miss patricia tells me that when she changes his diaper she always talks to him about our names and it's so funny because i'll say, 'cashel, say jason and he says jason but when i ask him to say robin he says mama!'

6. since the ncaa tournament is on these days he has managed to establish a position of watching the games while standing on one of our footstool cubes

7. more of his favorite words: no, shoes, bird, sit (while pointing at the puppies), and any noise he can make with his mouth

8. he loves, i repeat, loves to dance...he'll turn up the music on the stereo and go at it and often begins to shake his head and clap in the car when music comes on

speaking of shreveport

starbucks in shreveport:

jason orders a tall americano and pays with a credit card

some random man in line behind jason:
you must be a lawyer or somethin', huh?

jason:
uh....no

my weekend

it's true what they say...parenthood changes you. i almost can't remember what it is like to sleep in, spend time in the bathroom alone, read a book, go to a movie, catch up on dvr shows (i've actually deleted many programs lately), exercise, sleep through the night (i still get up at least once a night just to make sure cash is covered up), just sit...you get the picture. jason was working hard on a job that happened to take him to shreveport, louisana, for part of december and january. being a full time working single mom for that time made me, ok, i'll say it, crazy. i did my best but it was hard. cash had two double ear infections during the time jason was away and i was also sick. oh, how i love my husband and how cash loves his daddy so boy oh boy, was it hard! we did it as an experiment - we won't do it again.

an-y-hoo.....that is really just the background for this post. this post is about my wonderful valentine's day/birthday present that jason set up for me. he got me a hotel room for one night in.....pasadena! ok - so pasadena is where i work and is only 20 minutes from where i live but it was perfect! it was the first night i had spent away from cash since he was born. yes....i missed him and i missed jason but i loved the me time!

i stayed at the hyatt hotel close to shops and restaurants. i parked at my school and rode over one of my school's orange bikes (my school provides bikes for our use - we're only supposed to ride them between schools and the parking deck so if someone from my school is reading this i am totally busted!). i saw avatar, walked around the shops, ordered a pizza to my hotel room, worked on cash's baby book, watched tv, took a loooooonnnnggggg shower, slept in (until 6:45 - ha!), saw another movie, then came home refreshed!

it was wonderful. i would totally do it again. here's some pictures of my adventure.

thanks sweetie - i love you!

nana's moving to california!

nana visited a couple of weeks ago and....dun duh duh duh....GOT A JOB AND IS MOVING TO CALIFORNIA! here is a picture of nana trying not to force a hug from cashel - he's a hard sell with the hugging of anyone besides his mom or dad...

but look....it worked!

we are so excited that she is moving close (about 1/2 an hour away) because when california was just a dream for us she would always tell us "if you move to california, i'll move to arizona, because i love the southwest" and jason and i said "what for lady? to still be a plane ride away? that's crazy? you may as well stay on the east coast if your not gonna go all the way!" i guess she heard us - oh, and being close to her grandson is probably more motivation to live close than anything else....

here's cashel giving her an unsolicited kiss....i don't think jason's too happy about this (the unsolicited kiss i mean)...we're super happy she's moving... :-)

generations

we have a beautiful 98(!) year old grandmother living with my awesome parents. miss thelma long is wonderful. she is sweet and funny. when we were home for christmas we made sure that cashel paid attention to her but he was, like many very young kids, a little intimidated by her automatic chair and wheelchair so he kept his distance for the most part...but....you should have been there on our last day. cashel made sure that everyone knew that he loves his great-grandmother.


we were just playing around and all of the sudden he approached her...


so i put him in her lap and he looked up at her...


they exchanged some babble and its about this time we realize what a special moment this is so my mom jumps in the picture...


four generations...


did you see that? cashel just slipped his arm around her neck!


now fingers in the mouth...


by the way...cashel has more teeth than grandmother


a little peck on the cheek - what a sweet boy...


a kiss back...


i like your shirt, great grandmother - do you like my run dmc shirt? and she said, "why yes cashel, i'm listening to run's house right now!"


mimi stealing on of cashel's famous open mouthed kisses

ahhhh...

what a great moment...