10-31-10

Happy Halloween!

Dave and I took our Mermaid

and our little lamb

and we trick or treated!

Super fun!

Happy lamb

Sad lamb

Sleepy Lamb

Happy Halloween from the Heide's!

10-30-10

Thank goodness SOMEONE finally took a picture of us! (Thanks Kristen!) I get in these lulls where i just get tired of taking pictures. I'm over it now. Lots of pictures to come since the next few days are Halloween, Lily's birthday (not her party day, but we'll do something fun Monday for her birthday) and then Tuesday Lily and I are going to Rock N Glam for a hairdo girl date. (w00t)

Lily, Charlie and I headed to downtown Madison for their Family Friendly trick or treat. I loved seeing all the little kids in costumes! So fun!

Lily loves kissing all babies. Here she is kissing Charlie's friend, Ethan.

And here i am, carrying my baby Charlie lamb.

p.s. i love my ergo carrier. I went back and forth trying to decide whether to carry him or bring a stroller and as much as my back would prefer a stroller, it was so nice to let charlie feel included and loved and warm and getting in and out of all the crowded stores was so much easier!

10-29-10

Oh hi there!

I have been doing absolutely nothing that I have taken pictures of. Oops!

Visited with daves grandmother and aunts for a few days, and that was lovely. They visited just after charlies first birthday and got to see him walking and waving and being adorable. What a nice time!

We've also stayed busy, doing all the little things to ready ourselves for winter. Picking the last tomatoes. Finding all the pool toys from the yard. Moving the playroom from the 3 season (non winter!) porch to the front room of the house. Figuring out what we can donate from our garage to make lots of room. Little things, but they take a lot of time when managing two kids, 2 businesses, 2 dogs, 2 cats, etc.

More fun to come.

My little girl is turning 4 on Monday.

I am freaking out.

10-24-10

Vilas Zoo Halloween Party!

So fun! we've never been before, but we love the zoo, and we love halloween, perfect!

Lily met an owl. Hoot!

Charlie strollered :)

Lily was excited to see Henry the Lion, who visited us at Lilianas for our Mad City Mardi Gras to benefit the zoo and had the same lovely volunteer, Shirley, who is helping lily get over her fear of "character costume people"

it was super fun and we were glad the rain let up long enough for us to go. and also so everyone else could go and hopefully they donated lots of money to help support the zoo!

10-23-10

Busy busy saturday! The kids and I ran a million little errands, went to a playgroup, visited with family, then picked up a late supper for daddy, who had spent the day catering, competing in the dueling chef competition, and then working saturday night at the restaurant! Busy busy day!

of course the only thing we got pictures of, is playgroup! (and only because the other moms were smart enough to take pictures!)

Charlie practices the 5 "s's" of playgroup:

Smiling!

Standing!

Sharing!

Squishing!

Squirming!

10-22-10

Lilys teacher sent this picture from lunch bunch (once a week lily stays at school to have lunch with school friends) this week


Cute!

10-20-10

Charlie has made a development to his charming, confusing personality.

As of exactly his first birthday, he LIKES daddy.

He sort of tolerated daddy, as much as any other non-mommy-person can be tolerated or enjoyed. Sometimes daddy is funny or helpful, but is not a source of other useful things like comfort or milk and I'm not sure why this is. Lily readily accepted daddy as an equal parent from the start. Maybe it was because he was home more, stressed less and when he was working, generally we worked together at the restaurant construction site (OMG THREE YEARS AGO!). Maybe it was because we supplemented my breastfeeding lily with formula (at times up to 50/50) and so she received plenty of nourishment, snuggling, etc from daddy, which is not the case with charlie?

I dont know! In any case, Charlie just flipped a switch and decided they were buddies. enough that he sat with daddy for quite sometime at a long relaxed dinner out and without a bottle or anything else just relaxed and fell asleep.

I think working so hard for Charlie's affection over the last year made it a very exciting occasion!

10-19-10

bonus birthday video!

Charlie's First Steps from Tiffany Heide on Vimeo.

And it's Charlie's birthday, but I'm going to take a minute for me here. A year ago I felt the pain of laboring with a 10lb baby and I was brave and determined. My body is far from perfect but it was strong and beautiful in it's own way to naturally and safely deliver a big and healthy baby boy.

And it doesn't end there. This past year I have had some of my darkest moments. My "needy" baby is an amazingly different experience than my first, an "easy" baby. I have felt disappointment and guilt about things no one should. My body has screamed in pain from carrying 25lbs of baby every minute of the day, and-instead of resting- being tangled around his sleeping body all night. I've felt alone and unsupported with a baby who demands from only me when I had nothing left to give.

But we move on. My body heals, grows stronger. My soul has stretched to make room for both my babies. The strain of the constant need has turned into a deep and intense love.

I've learned I'm strong enough to do this.

I'm lucky to do this.

10-19-10

oh what a day!

on sunday my sweet boy was celebrated with a lovely evening on the patio, carving pumpkins, drinking grog and enjoying friends.

and there was so much to celebrate!

a beautiful boy who loves intensely, and is curious, smart, funny and strong.

and a community of family & friends and new friends through the restaurant, who love being with us! As Charlie visited with his RahRah then to our favorite raspberry farmer, then to the wife of one of our great musicians, then me and on to another new friends..I thought about how, as a transplant from California, I'm so lucky to have developed a large and secure support network. Love!

(click to make pictures bigger!)

and so, let them eat cake!

OMG Cake!

are you SURE this is okay? just warning you, i'm totally going to smash this cake!

too much cake?

More cake!

eep! cute! my girl made her own fun. flitting from table to table, chatting and visiting and enjoying the day.

i love my adaptable little girl. her own birthday will be here soon enough!

thank you to our dear lovely friends for celebrating our boy and making us feel loved!

10-18-10

get ready for a birthday post tomorrow.

it was a beautiful day.

heres a sneak preview

10-17-10

We are celebrating charlie's birthday today. I am excited but I'm worried I'm going to start crying!
My bbbbbbaaaaabbbbyyyyyyy is turning one!

Be excited for pictures of today if you like any of the following:
-cake shaped like pumpkins
-kids/babies in costume
-pumpkins
-pumpkin carving contests
-hot sauce
-Charlie
-balloon animals
-face painting
-birthdays
-cuteness

10-14-10

bike! my first bike since i was a kid and i love it!

slightly less carefree with the kids trailer hooked on, but still so fun. love!

10-12-10

we recently were part of photo shoot for the blog i never contribute enough to, Raising Madison, and First Moments Photography was able to get a lot of nice shots of our group, but lucky for me, she also got a couple of really nice ones of me and my kids!

my new favorite picture!

yes, charlie's shirt is vintage, has a cowboy, and is embroidered with the word "yahoo!". it also only cost 25 cents. pretty much the best ever.

10-10-10

oh hi there!

did you miss us? we've been busy, but we're mostly caught up now.

it was an unseasonably hot 85 degrees for a lot of the day today.

we enjoyed a lovely brunch on the patio

we went to the arboretum

we had a nice walk and a nice day.

10-8-10

lily "danced with" a princess. by "danced with" i mean was so mesmerized she couldn't move. watch till the end for a cute curtsey.

10-7-10

eugsters farm pumpkin patch fieldtrip.

we love eugsters because its fun and awesome (omg kittens!) but we were especially happy to support them this year a s they had a pumpkin blight and had to plow over 45 acres of pumpkins! :(

we were told they are working with experts on healing for next year but for this year they lost all that money AND had to order 20,000 pumpkins to supplement what they would have raised and sold during their fall season! yikes!

i have to say, i kind of preferred choosing from the rows of clean attractive pumpkins in an apple orchard rather than trudging through the mud with dirty pumpkin and fingers full of those weird sharp splintery shards from the vine. i know, i know. its authentic to be cold and muddy, but clean and comfortable is nice, too.

we love you eugsters, feel better soon!

10-5-10

these two are kind of the cutest ever. coral and i met for coffee before my flight and the girls wanted to sit by each other but wound up sharing a chair and chatting. they were super offended when they caught me taking their picture.

we miss you, hannah!

10-4-10

amanda- thanks for the cute halloween pajamas! charlie looked too cute snuggled in aunt tamis spooky blankets!

10-3-10

video of lily behind the bar at a restaurant. surprisingly, not lilianas!

my good friend/neighbor from childhood wound up marrying a chef and opening a restaurant, just like me. crazy right?!

so of course we had to go try it out while we were in california. it was amazing! so good to see a friend, so good to see lily fit right in at someone elses restaurant. lovely!

10-2-10

bates nut farm with the benjamin/thomas family. so cute, except its just wrong to pumpkin patch when its like 94 degrees!

10-1-10

Legoland!

Coral and I never went as "kids" (i think it opened when we were in high school? middle school?) so we took our cute kids and made a day of it.

It was more fun than I thought it would be! plenty that was accessible to little kids and lots of stuff for when they get bigger.

My absolute favorite part was "Miniland" the lego replicas of iconic cities. It was nice to feel like lily was getting some perspective on how amazing some of these places are. I was especially impressed by the Taj Mahal!

Made of legos, for crying out loud!

Mt rushmore! one place i've actually been to! (with coral actually, who was with me at legoland, fun coincidence!)

Of course I was drawn to New Orleans, and it was amazing!

mardi gras parade

parade!

look at all the detail, and it was all like this!

she was excited about R2D2 (huge star wars fan!) but was super scared of darth vader standing right next to him

hannah is so pretty, i love her boingy curls!

fun!