Tag Archives: weekend recap

Weekend Recap: Parental Ailments & Toddler Head Planks

You know how you can make awesome plans for the upcoming weekend only to have them fall out of place for one reason or another? That pretty much happened to us this past weekend.

Not like we had a full agenda lined up, we just planned on being in good health to tackle our backyard project and continue with my Squat Every Day routine. Well, an infected and inflamed eye for Going Mom and some sort of sharp pain (thinking rotator cuff tear) in my right shoulder kinda wiped the whole “in good health” part of our weekend out.

My poor wife has been battling her eye infection for several days and it has only gotten worse. I think, but we’re not entirely certain yet, that it’s on its way to getting better, but only time will tell. It’s driving her, and therefore me, crazy, and I wish I could do something to rid her eye of the crap.

For me, I’m sure my OCD habit to exercise with heavy weights almost daily helps my shoulder pain not one bit, but I keep going anyway. We had a lot of rain which made the ground nice and soft (very muddy), so I did what I could in the backyard by shoveling dirt and moving it out with a wheelbarrow. Yeah, all “smart” moves when you’re nursing an injured shoulder.

I’m hesitant to go to the doctor because, one, sometimes all symptoms disappear when I do, and two, making Avery go to the doc with me after her having to go not long ago would be traumatic for the poor girl. Again, time will tell, and then I’ll tell you here on the blog. I know you’re all concerned, right? 🙂

Speaking of, the one person not ailing this weekend was our growing girl, so that’s a plus!

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With a painful eye, Kelley still took some excellent shots of Avery while cleaning all around the house. We aren’t idle people, so even when we’re sick/hurt, we still find stuff to do. The house is much cleaner as a result.

Avery “helped” Mommy clean and rearrange things all over the house this weekend and she hardly wanted anything to do with me. I’d ask her one question and she’d run away whining to Kelley. Meh, I know it’s just a phase. Besides, I was able to get a lot of cooking done for my two beautiful girls without having to worry about tripping over a quiet toddler in the kitchen. Cooking parents, you know what I’m talking about.

Butternut Squash and Kale Fritatta=Winning
Butternut Squash and Kale Fritatta = Winning

She has become great at working out with Mommy and Daddy, and the newest exercise seems to be the plank. Luckily, she’s not doing that in the kitchen, yet, but a more advanced version using her head and rocking chair.

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I don’t know about you, but that would hurt my neck amongst other things and I’m proud of her feats. She knows she strong too. How strong you ask? Well…

We never taught her to pump her fist like that, but it’s only right that she does it to show her strength. Right?

Not much outside playtime happened as a result of the rainy weather, and poor Avery didn’t exactly understand.

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But getting to spend time with Mommy seemed to make her forget about outside. As is apparent….

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Now we’re back to the beginning of another week, but Kelley will be taking off to stay home as I go to the National At-Home Dads Convention from Thursday to Sunday. I’m excited, a lot, but I know I’ll miss my two girls back home and will be eager to see them on Sunday.

I have a little food prep to do so my wife can enjoy my excellent cooking (yeah, I’m biased) while I’m away. I feel this week, short as it may be, will still drag on.

Do you still find things to do when you should really just be resting?

Do you like going to conventions? Any ones in particular if so?

A Coffee, Toilet Paper, and Fun Family Weekend

Do you get caught up with the gazillion things on your to-do list and forget to just kick back and relax every now and then? We do, and it ends up consuming our weekend to where it’s Monday and the past two days are just a blur. This happens all too often, but this past weekend actually turned out to be a fun family weekend.

Every Friday, we kick off the weekend with a chocolate green smoothie. It used to be just for Kelley and I, but now Avery demands a daily green smoothie to be like Mommy and Daddy. How can I refuse when she’s begging for a drink that is full of healthy, whole foods?

I never follow a recipe, but the ingredients I have on hand are mixed berries, green banana, citrus, kale and other mixed greens, peanut flour, hemp protein, hemp seeds, plant protein powder, Great Lakes gelatinraw cocoa powder, coconut, carrots, beets, spirulina, NuttZo, sea salt, stevia, homemade kefir, unsweetened coconut or almond milk, and a husband/father’s love.

Phew, now I’m out of breath. Maybe I shouldn’t talk out loud when typing…..

Anyway, not all of those go in at once, that’s just the typical list of things we keep around and I will use. Back to Friday and chocolate smoothies; Avery quickly and happily downed hers as a pre-dinner drink and then went to bug Going Mom as she wash her face and got comfortable before dinner.

Drinking a Chocolate Green Smoothie

While she was behaving being a toddler in the bathroom, Avery got into the cabinets where we keep the toilet paper and proceeded to take all of the rolls out. This is nothing new, and that’s all we keep in the cabinet just to give her something to keep “occupied”. But, afterward, when Kelley was picking up the rolls, she spotted something…..

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Green smoothie bite marks. I guess the smoothie didn’t have enough fiber for her, so she found a way to supplement. At least she didn’t unravel the whole thing all over the house. Silver lining?

I made the usual grocery store trips to Costco and Sprouts on Saturday while Kelley and Avery stayed home. While out, I had a couple free birthday coffee offers to use, so I got a black iced coffee at Dunkin’ Donuts (the only time I’d ever go there) and a Trenta iced Americano with 8 shots of espresso at Starbucks.

I’m just now finishing the Americano, and even what’s left is hitting me with a good buzz. I couldn’t imagine if I drank it all in one day!

Later in the day, we took Avery to the neighborhood pool and had a blast playing with her. We started with her in the floating canopy she has, but eventually took her out to hold her.

Yeah, I'm ready for you to take me out now.
Yeah, I’m ready for you to take me out now.

We threw her in the air a few times, but she keeps a tight grip on our thumbs so it makes it very difficult to get her airborne. Then she found a new activity, kicking her feet and making big splashes.

No pictures or videos of her in action, but Going Mom and I took turns holding her in front of us with her legs out and kicking as fast as they could go. I’m pretty sure her goal was to splash water into her mouth since she kept it open the entire time. Whatever the case, Kelley and I both had the same thing in mind…..naptime success!!

And she slept pretty well as we figured hoped. Which led us to the obvious choice of doing the same thing on Sunday.

We started Sunday with coffee, as usual, but it was with a new French Press we ordered since the other one broke. Love the new press and know it was a great investment in our morning happiness!

Kelley spent most of the morning reading and playing with Avery as I prepped a few meals for the week ahead and our dinner that night; taco chili!! She spent a good amount of time with Avery on her training potty while reading almost every book we own until she pooped or peed. Finally, she peed, and we praised her for the tinkle. This is where the experience of owning a pet before kids pays off!

We eventually made it down to the pool for another kicking and splashing session, but Avery didn’t get into as much as the day before. She still kicked and splashed around, just not with as much vigor. Either because it was no longer new, or she was just tired from all of that potty training, but it was another fun family time at the pool regardless.

The rest of Sunday was spent flipping Avery on the pillow and blanket pallet I made in the living room along with doing a few household chores. Avery relaxed next to the pallet with a book and leftover green smoothie as we finished up.

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I should go eat some more toilet paper.

This past weekend ended up being an awesome time spent as a family and I look forward to many more as Avery gets older. Not that I’d ever rush her growing up, she’s done enough of that already!

Have you ever had an “eating toilet paper” experience?

Do your kids love or hate the pool?

2 Celebrations and I Ran Anyway

I know what you’re thinking. After my butt issue just a few days ago, why in the world did I run?! I’ll tell you, but first let’s talk about the two celebrations on Saturday.

This past weekend, one of our neighbors had a birthday party for their one year old girl, Seneca. Avery and Seneca are exactly 6 months apart, and I expect they’ll become good friends as they grow up together. I never got any pictures of the two together, or the birthday girl at all, but Avery had a great time with Mommy in the bounce house at the party.

Bounce House with Mommy_Seneca's B-Day

Two beauties smiling bright! Avery was a little shy at first, but she warmed up quickly and even played with her peers. From the looks of it, she’s really good at sharing with one of the neighborhood boys, Connor.

Playing at Seneca's B-Day

“Sharing”, it’s a loosely defined term, right? But “Cuddles”, now that’s fairly straight-forward, and she’s happy to give them when Mommy or Daddy (and sometimes strangers, yikes!) asks.

Hugging Daddy_Seneca's B-Day

We had a great time at the party and made it back home for a family walk and then nap time before heading back out again. We were meeting Kelley’s family as well as my mom and her boyfriend at a restaurant for a belated Mother’s Day celebration and it was great to see everyone.

When we meet up with family, Avery just makes her rounds being held and we get a little “freedom” for half an hour as others get their cute kid fix. It’s a win-win for everyone! We all had a good time talking with each other and Avery was very well-behaved……almost too well.

Before we knew it, we were on our way back home to get Avery to bed and wind down the night with 3 Walking Dead Season 5 episodes. Thank you, internet!

The half-marathon I talked so much about that was cancelled from severe weather last weekend (so I rowed 13.1 instead), was rescheduled for yesterday, the 17th. The venue changed twice from the original location and we had already checked out of even considering trying to go after my ER visit.

“Butt” (ha ha, get it?), I found myself having trouble sleeping and woke up earlier than usual on Sunday morning. This usually means I make my grocery shopping rounds early and be done with it, but this time, I had another perfect idea instead. Go to the race and then to the store!

True, I was specifically told not to run, and I’m still hurting a little down there, but when I pay for something it gets under my skin when I just give it up. That something would be the nice technical shirts and finisher’s medal you get, as well as a surprise Mother’s Day gift the event organizer mentioned. So I told Kelley, as she went to nurse Avery back asleep, I was leaving for the store and would be back soon.

I didn’t officially decide to drive to the race until I got in my car, then I figured why not, and thought it would be cool to bring back the Mother’s Day surprise gift for Kelley. Husband bonus points for me! I arrived right after the race started, so I gave the coordinators my spiel and they happily gave me a shirt for both my wife and I and agreed to give a Mother’s Day gift if I finished the race.

So I raced. But not the half-marathon, just the 5k, and I walked most of it, which was very muddy from the never-ending rain.

Muddy 5k Path

The nice thing about walking is you get to see more and take in the nice scenery. For example this really long worm along with dozens of his friends were on the entire course.

Big Worm at 5k

Yeah, so it wasn’t that great of scenery. I ended up running the last mile, but I was sorry for that later….stupid butt. At least it looked like I saw some action with a little mud splashed up my leg.

Muddy Leg

I didn’t wait around for my first place trophy (joke), just took a banana, which happened to be attached to several bananas…

Bananas at 5k

…got my finisher’s medal….

Mother's Day Run Medal…and Kelley’s Mother’s Day gift.

Mother's Day Run Fuel BeltA freakin Fuel Belt. They are nice, but I was thinking something more motherly. But what could I expect from a runners club? I actually think it will be great when out all day with Avery since it has a hydration pack and some storage.

Overall great weekend and I’m happy to say my ass is hurting less! I go in for check-up (no jokes) on Tuesday, so hopefully I have more good news to report then!

Do you feel like you have to get your money’s worth at events you sign up for?

Ever walk a race before? That was a first for me and it felt weird, but not that bad.
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