Contemplations and Concoctions

A Mommy blogging about life, love, food, and toddlers.

Just in case you all had wondered why I hadn't posted in a long time!  It's because cooking isn't appealing 95% of the time.  Hopefully soon I'll be back at it.  I'm hoping to do my Daring Bakers challenge this weekend.  Wish me luck!

The weekend is only half over and already it's been one of the best in memory.  I love spending time with Tim and our son on the weekends.  It reminds me what is important and what really doesn't matter.  When I gave birth to Riley I remember looking at Tim holding him just after while we still waiting in the delivery suite for my room to open up and thinking "Wow! I really love this man" and ever since then I've been looking at him and he just surprises me more and more.  The way he is with Riley just reaffirms for me that I made the right choice when I decided to marry him (after dating for 7.5 years!).

This past week has been a pretty good week. I know I say that all the time but I guess it's my "normal" answer for when things go well but not super duper fantastic.

Bright and early this morning Riley, Tim and I all got in the car and drove down to Hawrelak park.  When I say bright and early I do mean bright and early.  Thankfully Riley was a trooper  and after a very hard night before and going to bed at 7:30 he was up bright eyed and bushy tailed at 7:30 am.  I wouldn't normally be thrilled about this but since we needed to leave around 8:30 it was good. 

This weekend was pretty good.  Tim, Riley and I all piled in the car on Saturday morning to go downtown for their swimming lessons at the YMCA.  It was lots of fun, Riley is finally (for the past two lessons) warming up to being in the water with Tim.  He doesn't reach for me anymore and actually giggles and smiles a lot now.  His friends C & C were there.  We've been taking lessons with them since the very beginning.  I've really enjoyed getting to know them they are great girls and the little one is so sweet.  She also gives me a reason to buy pink things!  My little one sure doesn't need pink!  Bedsides the fact I'm pretty sure that Tim wouldn't allow it.  He was the one that insisted Riley could NOT wear a "dress" to his baptism.

This is the aftermath from too much partying!  Swimming, shopping, cake... what else could a 19 month old ask for in one day!

I love C.S. Lewis.  I find his writing hard to put down.  I've read the Narnia series so many times in my life I'm sure I could repeat parts of it to you.  I can barely wait for Riley to big enough that I can read it to him.  I'm very excited about Prince Caspian coming out tomorrow (May 16th) and plan to go to it next week when I have a babysitter!  Tim has been working his way through the Narnia collection but hasn't gotten to Prince Caspian yet.  I guess he'll just have to see the movie first.  C.S. Lewis and his wonderful books about a fantasy land were a big part of my childhood and I still read them occasionally.

Well... this isn't what I had originally written up to post about today but maybe I just wasn't supposed to post it.

One of my fellow Mommies a couple weeks back asked me what classes I had Riley in as we were leaving our swimming class. Which made me think to myself "should him and I being doing more classes?". I answered that I had him in swimming and I take him to the library for a sing/read along when he gets up early enough.

The Mommy seemed satisfied with my answer. But it made me think about if I was really doing enough for Riley. Is he being stimulated enough? Is he learning enough? Am I making sure that his potential is being pushed as far as it can?

I hear a lot about people that are putting their toddlers in many activities. Ranging from swimming lessons to "baby band" all the way to toddler 2nd language classes. Are these necessary? Am I hindering Riley's learning by having him spend time with me during the day instead of in a class learning something?

I thought this article about Mother's was just to good not to share.  The Mother's War.  Read it, it's worth the five minutes. 

Mother's Day is, to be honest, somewhat of an annoyance. It's manifestly one of those tedious Hallmark holidays wherein everyone is supposed to run out and support the revenue stream of cardboard manufacturers in the name of expressing gratitude to mothers, fathers, grandparents and anyone else to whom we might be related.

Just wanted to share with you all the wonderful little man that has given me the ability to be able to share in this day.  Hope all the Mommies I know and love out there had a wonderful day!