webcam

yesterday we finished skypeing with my sister and noticed the webcam was still on. i started taking pictures and jack thought it was the coolest thing EVER. he cracked up every time the camera clicked. please note he is now a full-fledged toddler with zero traces of baby left on him.

in other news, we're in the market as it were. (pirates reference.) our apartment contract is up next month (we've almost been here a year, hooray!) and we decided it's high time we got a house -- for rent, not keeps. after living in apartments for the past 6 years, a backyard and a third bedroom sound downright dreamy. this also means DECISIONS...my least favorite topic. as of today we've narrowed it down to two good options, both of which mean lots of change. i'm so scared of commitment. pray for us that we can make a good decision! [heaven help me when (if) it comes time to actually BUY a home. my brain will probably short-circuit.]

GNO reminder

the night before i left on my trip, i went to a little "sprinkle" (i.e. mini baby shower) for my friend megan, who is in the hospital right this very minute having her second baby. megan was one of my very first friends when we moved here and probably my best washington friend, i love her. however, the day of her party, b got home from work late and i still had to pack and we'd had something going every night that week so i was thiiiis close to just bagging the whole thing and staying home. BUT i rallied and went anyway.

...and i seriously had the BEST night ever, more fun than i've probably had in months. we had hamburgers at lunchbox laboratory -- maybe the most delicious burger i've ever eaten, with enough calories to keep me completely full all through the rest of that night AND through a 10 mile run the next morning, sheesh! -- and laughed and talked for hours. afterward my good friend jen and i even snuck away to go shopping at the mall! it was blissful -- there is just something about getting together with girlfriends that feels SO good. i see my friends all the time of course, but we're usually too distracted by our kids to have an actual conversation -- getting a night out with just the ladies was perfect.

girls nights fall into an exclusive category with other indulgences like massages and manicures -- things i don't usually seek out on my own, and on the way there i usually second guess myself the whole time saying "oh, i don't really need this." and then when they are over i am sooooooooo happy i did it. so this is me, posting a reminder for future lyndsey: just do it!

72 hours in NYC

last saturday i flew to new york city! it was my first time leaving jack for more than 24 hours and i felt kind of guilty about it...but i'm not going to lie, getting 5 whole hours all to myself to sit on an airplane and do whatever i wanted felt like a total luxury. not to mention the three days of fun that followed.

the main purpose of my trip was to attend the national stationery show. if you're new, here's a quick recap of my life: in 2009 i started a blog all about stationery. i am NOT a big deal by any means and there are other stationery bloggers much cooler than me. but i love pretty paper and i've been regularly blogging there ever since.

the stationery show is like the super bowl of the industry, and i'd been dreaming of going ever since i started my blog -- but didn't actually plan on ever coughing up the money to fly all the way to NYC. that is, until last fall when the powers that be asked me IF I WANTED TO SPEAK ON A PANEL AT THE SHOW. um, yes please. three of those actual, legit bloggers, plus little me, hosting a seminar about current trends in stationery. attending was a no brainer -- this was, like, bucket-list worthy for me. speaking at NSS?! i had died and gone to heaven. 

if only everything had gone according to plan. it rained that day and (as you can see above) my hair decided to go completely insane, so i looked like a frizzy crazy person. our panel went smoothly overall but i definitely felt like the odd man out...like the others were so professional and serious, and i was just this little blogger who likes to talk about stationery every once in a while and doesn't know her stuff. chalk one up to a learning experience, i guess. we definitely kept my ego in check.

the stationery show as a whole was beautiful, amazing, overwhelming and fun. you can read my recap posts on the stationery place where i've got tons of photos and details.

to make this little trip a bit more economical and productive, i combined the NSS visit with some PR business. one of my blogger clients, amy, met me in NYC and we had meetings with HGTV magazine and parents. parents magazine is one of my all-time favorite pubs and i feel so lucky to have worked with them a few different times, so i was SUPER excited to finally tour their offices and meet my editor-friends face to face. finally, a successful part of the trip for me to feel happy about :)

and, before any of the work stuff started, i was lucky enough to squeeze in some free time around the city! randomly, one of my roommates from college was visiting NYC the same weekend so i met up with em & her friends for some frozen hot chocolate & catching up.

i went to church in the manhattan temple and spent some time with one of my co-workers from american crafts, mary martha. she just had twin baby boys and i looooved snuggling them and helping out during church, lunch and afternoon playtime.

i left mary martha's house and took myself on a long walk through the city -- from 66th all the way to my hotel on 28th st. it was sunny and warm and crowded and i loved being back in my old stomping grounds. such good memories from my NYC internship!

and of course i had to swing by this big guy -- my favorite building in the world -- as much as possible. TODAY marks exactly six years since b showed up on the observation deck of the empire state building and asked me to marry him -- funny that i would be back in the city the same week as that anniversary. i said yes, of course, but spent our whole engagement freaking out (i'm a bit of a commitment-phobe, if you didn't know;) -- i'm pretty sure if he hadn't popped the question in such a completely amazing way, i might just have backed out...and subsequently missed out on the best decision of my life. well played, b.

i managed to squeeze in a tiny bit of shopping and dining while there, but spent most of the trip either working or zipping around the city in taxis, buses and subways. wish i had had a few days more just to relax and play tourist! tuesday night it was time to come home and i barely caught a glimpse of the new freedom tower on my train ride out to JFK.

while i was gone, everyone did great! b and jack had some awesome father-son bonding time, and i had a couple of amazing friends take SUPER good care of jack while b was at work. i am so, so grateful for a fantastic husband and kind friends who help me out while i'm able to do stuff like this. but, unfortunately, i've been paying for the trip ever since i got back. major work catch up, chores, out-of-the-ordinary tantrums from the little person...i'd really like my life to stop being a string of never-ending crises, but i guess that's not going to happen. at least i got a tiny break from reality for a few days!

mama day

happy mother's day to all the women out there! i love mother's day. even before i was a mom i loved everything about it -- celebrating my own amazing mama; recognizing all the women out there who touch the lives of others, biologically connected to them or not; watching the cute kiddos sing in church; getting a free candy bar ;)

my boys spoiled me today! b made breakfast AND dinner, jack signed a monkey card for me, i got a new running belt to wear during my half marathon training. plus i feel so lucky to be this little guy's mama.

i'm finally finishing up my second blog book (despite the drama of my first attempt) and this week i edited the posts and photos from july 2010. aside from being completely disgusted by how HUGE i was (all you people who said i looked like a cute pregnant girl were totally LYING) i absolutely loved reminiscing over those photos from the day jack was born. i am so glad my cousin was there to beautifully document that moment. and i can't believe that was almost two years ago!!! time seriously hits fast-forward once you have kids, but i can honestly say i've loved every single day since then.

also this week, one of the MBA wives passed away. i didn't know her well; her husband was a year behind b in school but i remember seeing her around. she contracted an infection while giving birth to their third baby and died a few days later. i haven't been able to get that sweet family out of my head...it breaks my heart to think of them having to go on without her, but it kills me even more to think she won't be able to raise her kids! being a mom is really the BEST thing i've ever done and i feel so lucky to spend my days building train tracks and making car noises and teaching colors and changing diapers. i'd be so sad if that came to an end...but i'd be SO grateful to know that my family can be together forever, even beyond death. sadness and separation are just a split second in an eternity of joy. i'm a mama forever, no matter what happens -- and that is the best present of all.

dinner picnic

last night was one of my favorite nights we've had in washington yet. the past two days have been warm and sunny (never in my life, by the way, have i used the weather as such a frequent topic of conversation as i have since moving to seattle -- i swear, it is ALL we talk about around here) and we've spent a lot of time outside.

yesterday afternoon, some friends invited us to join them for dinner down by the lake and it was perfect. we live just a few miles away from lake sammamish and i had seen signs for a state park nearby, but we hadn't ever been down to check it out. last summer we just went to the pool when it was hot, plus jack was too little to do much of anything, so i didn't feel a big need to seek out alternative activities. little did i know we were minutes away from an amazing spot!

we went down to the beach -- there was a little park, a bunch of picnic tables, a rocky shore and a beautiful view. we ate a yummy picnic and played till the sun went down. i loved every second -- i think we'll be back a LOT this summer.

non-tulip festival

last week i got to have a mini pasadena reunion with some of my favorite friends! sachia came to town with amber, a new pasadena-ite who grew up here, so they hosted a little playdate for me & jack and our friends natalie & fallon. (if you're paying attention, natalie is the SAME natalie who was my roommate in college and then later my neighbor in pasadena -- and now we both live in seattle! weird, i know.)

the mamas chatted while the kids played. or rather, the girls played and jack monopolized all the trucks. per usual, he was the only boy there, so he spent a lot of time trying to figure out what the girls were talking about. barbies? lame.

we tried to line them up for a photo and the results were comical. how many adults does it take to get 4 kids to sit still? (not going to lie, doing this reminded me of all the times i stood on the sidelines in pasadena while all the parents tried to set up the kiddie group shots. yessss...finally i'm in the mom crew too!)

this is the best we could get. why oh why must everything be so difficult at this age?

our brilliant plan was to have a play date and then check out the tulip festival, which according to my facebook feed is THE thing to see in seattle in the spring. unfortunately we were way past naptime and nearing a meltdown, so i decided to hit the road -- BUT, since i was so close, i couldn't resist doing a quick drive by. 

side note: i had already driven an hour for the play date, and the tulip festival ended up being another 30 minutes farther away. i was trying to navigate on my phone but doing a crappy job, and by the time i got close to the actual tulips jack looked like this in the backseat:

so he was out, i was in a bad mood for coming so far and seeing nothing, and i still had a 90 minute drive ahead of me. definitely not going to be heading out on a tulip adventure. i turned the car around and managed to snap a couple quick pictures of the giant tulip fields -- they WERE pretty, but i didn't need to touch them to know that. 

then it was homeward bound. jack woke up screaming when we still had 20 minutes to go, that was fun. but at least we'd seen some pretty scenery and partied with our friends. all in all, a successful day.

family bonding

this might finally be my last post about our california trip :) while there we did a lot of good old-fashioned family bonding: catching grant up on movies (like inception & captain america), playing bang!, sitting around, eating food, talking about iphones. some of our extended family came to town too and it was so fun to just sit and chat and do nothing but enjoy hanging out with everyone. since all of us live in different states, opportunities like this don't happen very often -- so i was perfectly content to sit and enjoy being surrounded by my family.

one night, granty cooked for us! authentic mexican bbq. why yes, it WAS completely delicious, thanks for asking :) 

had to fit in the requisite family photo shoot:

the highlight for jack -- oh, you mean, besides being the center of attention in a group of easily amused adults all week? -- was my sister's dog, max. he is SO much more fun than roxy and jack loved him. jack and max would chase each other around the house, lick each other's tortilla chips (shudder), hug and dance and run. it was adorable and has me seriously considering getting a dog.

and then...it was time to head home. i was really sad to leave my family (and the gorgeous 80 degree weather) but as soon as we got back to seattle everything felt right again.

i'm learning that my REAL home is wherever b and jack are, and for now that's in washington. i love being back to our regular routine and our little life up here, and -- miracle of miracles -- even the rain & frigid temperatures (in MAY, people! sheesh) haven't bothered me lately. guess i'm finally growing up.