The Best Playgrounds / kids water parks in St. Louis?

Ladies, mommies... Come help me build a list of local parks that have great playgrounds for the kids and also parks that might have water spout / sprinkler features.... I want to take Julia on a Sunday park tour for the next month or so and find new places she will love climbing around in / on / and getting wet at.


My pick so far is DesPeres Park at Ballas and Manchester. 2 Great playgounds and a water sprinkler pole!!!!! (hint, the timer for the water pole is just inside the bathroom gate on the wall between the mens and ladies bathroom doors. 15 minutes of fun time before you have to turn the dial again. Thanks to Boris & Jen for letting us know that. They are working on rebuilding the parks fishing pond, but I hope they have it done soon. I'll try to keep you posted on that one.

Where is your favorite park to play?

location:
city:
suggested age of play:
what type of equipment is there?
water sprinklers?


Oh and I forgot to mention... we would like to find parks that are FREE... but if you so think there is a good price for another type of play time then please do share that and let us know how much it costs to get in per person.

OMG.. look at these sweet hallmark ornament give aways....

I love me new ornaments so I just had to enter.

over at gotcha baby check out these 4 ornaments so far this week:
today: Horton Hears who

yesterday: Christmas in July : living on baby time

Tuesday: Christmas in July : Inspi(red)

Monday: Christmas In July

gogurt is her new love

I bought some gogurt on sale two weeks ago (with coupon!) and fed one of them to J that night. She liked it, but was frustrated I had to help her with it. Too messy for a 9.5 month old to feed to herself. I put it in the freezer and decided that I would try and feed them to her like that. She loved them even more! Last night and tonight I have fed her one whole stick of frozen gogurt. She will let me feed them to her too without fuss. This is so fun because she sits on the kitchen floor and gets upset I can't feed it to her fast enough. I guess she does not want to hold the stick because it is so cold on her little hands, but she sure loves it on her gums.

Speaking of her gums. Those teeth are going crazy on her. She now has 3 teeth all the way through the gums. Her two bottom teeth that were coming out all wrong a few weeks back went back in and are now broke through the gums coming up the correct way. Ahhhhh. Glad that those two did not come out pointing to the bottom front lip like they were trying to. Then she has one more up top that is through the gum also. It is her second tooth over, not her front like I thought would come in first. Crazy.
I am just glad she is so little that she won't remember the pain it causes when those teeth break through the gums. OUCH, poor little girl. I know all you moms out there understand this feeling where you are helpless in fighting the pain except for orajel or teething tablets or the typical oral pain meds your doc allows you to use on them.
I felt helpless the other night after a round of teething tablets, tylenol and later dimatap for her cold as she was still crying. She did not want to drink her milk from the bottle because it hurt her to suck and then it hurt her to have her binkie in her mouth too. I gave her the frozen teething ring and that seemed to help a big for about 10 minutes and then the crying started in again. Ouuwwwieeeeee. I wish mommy could make it all better with the snap of a finger.

The other night we got into the swim pool and she had a blast in there. I can't find a swim lesson schedule online for the local YMCA .. I must not be looking in the right section of their web page to find that schedule so I could book a class for her. Anyone take swim lessons at the new YMCA on Sublette?

Happy 10 month Birthday my baby girl..thinking of her birthmother too

This morning I woke up early at 5:30 am and fed the doggies. I did not want to wake our little princess, Julia, instead I let her sleep in. Well that lasted about another 25 minutes or so. LOL. I think she has a built in alarm clock sometimes that follows her from her normal weekday routine into Saturday and Sunday's when we are home. As I type this at 8:19 am, she is sleep in daddy's arms while they sit on the couch and DH watches Meet-the-Press with the Democratic Presidential candidate.

When Julia first got up this morning she and I went back into our bed and she promptly woke her daddy up by calling "Dada" and hitting him on the back. He rolled over and snuggled with her for a few minutes. I said, "Happy 10th month Birthday Julia". He looked at me and said, "I still sometimes can't believe I am a daddy". So sweet. It is really a blessing that we have her in our lives and she has completed our desire to become parents. All thanks given to her birthmother for making this possible. (And our friend C that put us in contact with Julia's birthmother.)

Speaking of her birthmother, I hope she is doing ok today. I wonder if these little monthly birthday reminders make her hurt (emotionally), or do they make her happy knowing she placed Julia with us? I sure hope it makes her happy. In fact, she has told us she is so lucky to have us in her life to have an open adoption relationship. She always promptly gives us a hug when we see each other in person and always whispers "Thank you" in our ears! That melts my heart. I know we have offered for her to see a counselor, but she has not taken us up on the offer and I don't push it every time we see her. I tell her I am so proud of her and so thankful for her in our lives and we can't wait until the next time we see her and her two kiddo's. (J's half birthsister and birthbrother.). I don't have a direct way to get in contact with H so we have to go through mutual friends to get a gathering set up. I do know where she lives, but I feel as though I am intruding in on her life if we just drop by. I do keep writing my letters and gathering pictures together to give to her each time we have a "family" meeting. She is always so thankful for them and this last time I gave her the envelope, I did ask her to open it to view the pictures and share them with everyone, but I told her to read the letter later if she rather not read it at that time out loud. She put the letter in her pocket and then sat with J's birthsister and they had a blast looking at the pictures. I usually give them between 15-25 pictures with each of her letters. These average about 1 letter every 3-4 months.

This brings me to a article I read recently on the adoptive Families website. I wanted to share this link with you so you could get a perspective of just a few emotions a birthmother can go through before and after birth.
It is called, "When Birthmoms Get the Blues"
http://www.adoptivefamilies.com/articles.php?aid=1742

I always think of H and her feelings, especially just after we have all met up in person. I say a prayer that she may feel at peace with her decision to have placed J with us and that she is able to use this peace to boost her self-esteem and keep moving forward no matter how tough it can get. She is busy with her children, but I know she is always thinking of J also.

How have you dealt with your child's birthmother/parents contact and emotions after having adopted? Do you send letters & pictures to the agency? Or do you see them in person and give them the letters and pics then?


this as last week when we went to the zoo. Daddy made her a Build-a-Bear Leopard, but she was fast asleep through the whole thing. LOL

This was a few days ago when she was trying to help me fold clothes. The only way I could keep her from pulling the clothes out of the basket and onto the floor was to put her in there with the clothes. She loved it. Reminds me of when I was a youngster and we used laundry baskets to slide down the 3 story house steps we had. Oh boy, I hope she never tries that in a laundry basket.

twitter is tweeked out... what up wid dat?

is twitter tweeking out on you too? Not good. I lost a few I am following too and now it is slow and "over capacity" .. LOL

Ok, no matter anyway because I am out go to set up for this here yard sale tomorrow. Fun. NOT.

oh my poor baby girl. I love her so no matter how cranky she is!

tonight we confirmed that she has resurfaced one of her bottom two front teeth again. Yes again. This post back in May about her teeth coming in forward makes me wonder now long this has been in progress to pop back up through the gums and not forward like they had been. DH and I actually saw her two bottom teeth coming out forward through her lower gum out towards her lower lip. Straight out. Well, in a few weeks after I posted that, those teeth had regressed into the gums again and must have worked their way to a normal appearance up through the gums like normal kids experience, still painfully so. So tonight confirms that one of those two teeth have popped through the gums growing up towards the upper gum like they should be. So officially right now she has 2 teeth IN her mouth popped through. One upper second spot tooth on her right side and one lower gum first tooth on the left side. SWEET. No wonder the poor girl has been a snot nosed whining sweetheart of a dream daughter! No, I don't complain about this process like most, I am so enjoying the growth spurts she is going through and these bring her much closer to us because she becomes more clingy to us while this happens. Tonight she got a 6 oz bottle, sucked that down dry so DH gave her another 4 oz and she drank 3 of that so the little piggy growing girl had 9 oz before bed! Yeah. Normally she does 4 6oz bottle through the day. But this shows she is growing so much now and needs that little extra in her tummy to get through the night.

As I type this out, she sleeps in her crib behind a shut door to make it very dark in there. She sleeps on her front of her knees/legs with butt hiked way up in the air and her head turned to one side while most of her torso weight bares down on her shoulders with hands wrapped tight smashed between the crib mattress and her chest wall. She insists on holding her blanket. Such a sweetheart when she sleeps. She is a little restless tonight due to the couch she has, but is getting a good fair amount of sleep.

gotta work on finding a replacement blanket for her green one she has. I'll post a picture of it later this weekend.


IT IS YARD SALE TIME... Email me through this blog and I'll tell you what the address is if you are interested. Infant, baby - teen-adult clothes, some furniture, some electronics, some jewelry (my sister is bringing that) and some home made crafts from my mom for baby items and misc things.


I'll post later this weekend with how the yard sale goes. Please pray for NO RAIN saturday from 7-12.

sorry 2 b late w/my wordless wednesday

dealing w/ a cold infested little girl who has somewhere between 3-5 teeth trying 2 pop through right now. the poor girl hates me because I tricked her into taking her grape flavored dimeatap cold and cough dose tonight. LOL

Here is a picture for Wordless Wednesday that I just love. We were at our friends house this past weekend and she wanted to keep playing with this coupe car, but she kept sliding down through the seat to the floor. LOL I have to find her one of these coupe cars.



I just love this picture. This proves she will be walking very soon and one day will be very athletic or a gymnast. I can't stop her from climbing on her toys.

great weekend for friends & family time, oh and yard sale finds

Saturday morning Julia and I set out to meet our friends and their children (all from the local infertility support group) for a play date at Des Peres Park. Just before that we hit a few yard sales on the way and these are the great bargains we found....
Fisher Price Bounce and Spin Zebra


and the Little Tikes Alligator Piano.



both for a total bargain price of 10.00 (yes, that is 5 bucks each. ) not a single thing wrong with them and Julia loves them both so far. Might drive DH crazy with the panio, but he is the one that changed the batteries in the gator piano and got it working so I'll lay the blame on him. ha. \


we got to the park and had a blast playing with her friends.
we then went to our friends house that we played with their two daughters and enjoyed some holding time for the twins of our other friends. I wish I had more hands (daddy's ) help with Julia or else I'd have gotten more of the twins (H & J are just a few months old now and I really wanted to hold them). I got some clothes for Julia and they are so cute. I think we found the next "pictures" outfit. Sweet clothes! Thanks to J and B!


Today we got up very early and headed to the most fabulous place (well, actually I was disappointed on the trash on the grounds) of the St. Louis Zoo! We got there around 8:30 and J enjoyed the first visit we made, The St. Louis Children's Zoo area. She so wanted to get in the water fun fountains, but we opted not to do that since it was not "hot" yet and it was our first visit of the day. So we then saw the polar bears, rode the carousel and went to Build a bear! On the way back from Daddy making her the very first Build a Bear Zoo Friend Leopard, we went on a train ride around the whole zoo. How fun and how fun it was to have brought back some great memories of riding the train when I was a wee little one! That train ride has not changed one bit, FUN! We even got mooned by a grizzly bear (man in costume) when leaving one station! hehe

Have any of you ever been able to make it through the WHOLE zoo in one day? If so, how many hours did it take you?



From there we went to our nieces 8th birthday party for our families and had a great time. Julia is just loving playing with her cousins now.

Milestones: while standing in the middle of the room, she took one step forward with her left foot today and then fell to the ground. It is just a matter of days before she gets the courage and full balance to take that step. Watch out, I've been told our world will never be the same with a walking infant in the house! hahahahaha.. I know, I laugh now, but I am enjoying every moment of this girls everyso growing life.

gotta go make a grocery list for tomorrow night. Even more fun.

socks, to wear them or not during the summer?

I was at the ball game recently and had a lady sitting next to us with a 9 month old boy. She had thick baby socks on his feet. I looked over and said, "Oh, socks at this time of year?" ... She was taken back a little, but later agreed it was hot out and took them off. I am talking 95 degrees with sweltering humidity. (We were in the shade so granted!)

Do you put socks on your child during the summer?

honestly, Julia has not had on a pair of socks since the first week of June 2008. I know only a few pairs of socks would fit her feet that remain in that drawer that I have obviously not touched in ages now.

Julia is oh so close to walking now so shoes might become a must sooner than later. When did you have your little one wearing shoes ..... As they were walking or a few weeks after they did walk? I only ask because after reading a few books and surfing for the best motherly advice online I have come up with a nearly split opinion on when a child just walking need to or should wear shoes. Give me your opinions ladies (an men)!

Ahhh, time for some fun daughter love over the weekend. I have the pass to the Zoo for Sunday morning. Tomorrow is playdate with a bunch of friends and their children at a West County park. FUN. I can't wait. Camera ready and extra bread to feed the ducks.

Wordless Wednesday

dealing with tempers.....

ok, I need to really get out the books for coping with a childs temper. Is it normal for a 9 month old to have a temper so strong? Even my sister (her full time babysitter) said she is really strong headed when it comes to showing her temper. She tends to hit back at me if I tell her no. Such as.... tonight she was sitting in the kitchen sink and playing with the water. I told her to not play with the handle so that she does not turn it to HOT water. I know, she does not really understand that yet, but I know she knows the word NO. I said Julia, no, don't touch the handle. She immediately pushed my hand aside each time and then slapped me with her hand. Intentional slap too! How do I curtail this slapping? I know she will go through stages of different levels of her temper, but how do I get the message of no through to her without her hitting back? She slapped my niece (who my sister also babysits full time) the other day while they were both in the kiddie pool. Julia wanted the water hose to herself and apparently slapped my niece with her open hand when my niece tried to reach for the hose too. Bahahahaha

I have to laugh at this, but her temper is so strong. Any suggestions?

score! Thank you craigslist for the sellers of toys!

This is my score for the week for Julia. Fisher Price laugh and learn Home. I found it on craigslist this past week for 30.00. SWEET DEAL. All parts there except for 1 of the plastic balls. The seller told me she will look for it at home again.

My daughter LOVES it. I cleaned it up and then she played with it for over a 1/2 hour last night before bedtime. I'll have to try and get a picture of her enjoying this bargain of a great learning toy!

latest of Julia milestones... She is saying "hawwwoowwww" when she puts her phone up to her ear now. (score from the resale shop for 66 cents with working batteries!)

can't sleep so my thoughts are running wild

I often try to find the blogs of the women I went through IVF / infertility treatment cycles with from some of the internet forum boards I was on. Man, I have lost touch with so many. I have moreso lately bookmarked blogs that relate more to my time in my life now, Parenting after Infertility and Adoption (also those that suffer miscarriages still). I migrate to these blogs that talk about the feelings they are dealing with in the adoption side of their lives, questions they get asked publically, staring that happens when a family is transracially formed by adoption, open adoption, family reactions to such adoptions and how birthmothers/birtfamilies are doing after a placement has been made. (that includes the birth siblings of an adoptive child, like J).

I had to mention to my sister yesterday that if she does take J to the local movie theater that hosts free kids movies that there might be a chance that she could run into a part of the birthmothers family of Julia. Maybe her birthsister, birthbrother and even her birthmother! They don't live far from us and the movie house that is hosting this free event is near smack dab in the middle of where we live and where J's birthmother lives!!!!! I know they go to these free events often because a mutual friend of the birthmothers and ours gave us the list of movies and movie houses they are playing at.

At first my sister was a little taken back that she might have an encounter like this, but after a few minutes I could tell she was relieved to know this could happen to her if she is out and about with all the kids (she has her 3, my brothers 3 and Julia each day (all cousins!! FUN)). I wonder if my sister will ever have "adoption" type questions thrown at her about us having adopted Julia and how is it that we can have such an open adoption like we do. We are honest with people and let them know how it works. Of course we don't share details of our visits, but just that an overall understanding of how we meet and how we let things just fall into place every few months for when we all feel the need to see each other. It really does work out well. I know one day we will all run into each other in public by chance and I wanted to let my sister know this so she could be prepared to answer any possible questions my nieces and nephews might have as to who these other people are. I told my sister to tell them they are our extended family now. J's birthfamily told us they consider us extended family now too.

I love our open adoption and am glad to share the ups and downs with anyone if they want to ask. I am proud of J's birthmother and we are so very very blessed to have her in our lives and for J to grow up knowing they all love her so much!

ok, off to bed. That is my random thought of the night... OOPS.. scratch that... random thought of the morning since it is now 1:12 am. bah.

gotta work tomorrow too. ick

time to try to win something for you new moms out there...

Win the Essential Babywearing Stash from Along for the Ride (one Beco Butterfly, one Hotsling baby pouch, one BabyHawk Mei Tai, one Zolowear Ring Sling, and one Gypsy Mama Wrap)





WOW.. if I Could win even one of these they list, I'd be willing to do a review on it ASAP.


go try it out.

Her first Fourth of July in the outside world...

Last year at this time, J was in her tummy mommy's tummy. We had been in contact with her for a few weeks now by this time last year. So this year we celebrated in grand style.

First of all, here is her outfit. Yes, very patriotic.

She was able to see the fireworks that night, but this was just before the sun went down. She was trying so hard to get our attention outside while daddy was inside with her.



I sat and watched the fireworks with her on my lap. She did get a little spooked and cried at the screamer bottle rockets, but I bundled her up in a dry towel and let her watch as she clung to me in a kangaroo style hold. She loved the fireworks, color and bright bursts. (I wish I had given Dh the camera to show you, but I have this memory molded deep in my heart and will never forget this, her first 4th of July). This is some of the fun the kids (including DH) were having by the lakeside).




Thank you Lord for such a blessing of family and friends and our daughter and her birthfamily.


thank YOU so much!

He cooks, he cleans, I love this man

My husband!

he even changes poop filled diapers for my daughter!

He rocks. I love this man!

I hope you all had a Happy 4th of July weekend. Oh wait, It is only Saturday (or early Sunday).. one more day to go and we are hosting a bbq. FUN.

ut oh.. daughter is waking up. I think she is having some major dream episodes tonight. Is she too early to do this in age?

have any of you taken your child's clothes to OUAC?

Once Upon A Child, is it worth taking these 0-3 3-6 6-9 month clothes to sell to them?

Some new, some gap, gymboree, baby lulu, old navy, carters(lots of new items we never took the tags off of)...etc...

Sure, I want to keep these for baby #2 in the future (long future), but I honestly don't have the storage at my house.

Have any of you done the selling to Once Upon A Child?

she said... owwwiiieeeeee, that shot hurt, but look at how big I am

Monday June 30th 9 month doctor appointment stats are:

17.15 lbs (30 percentile in weight)
27 7/8 Inches Tall (50 percentile in height)

he predicts she will be approx 5'4" tall and 130 lbs by young adulthood.

I still predict she will be taller. She seems so much taller than 27 7/8". She has started needing 18 month onsies and 12 month summer outfits at 9 months of age. I tell you, this girl will be tall.
here she is in the camper trying to get something off the table. hehe