Rice Rice Baby

Do you like that all my baby activities can be set to the tune of Vanilla Ice?

I threw this together quickly while Cruz was napping. 

Forgive the awful pictures.

But he loved it so I thought I would share.

We have been playing with rice in the sensory bin for quite some time now. It's SUCH an easy and cheap activity that can change and grow with children.

When he was really little he was happy to just run in through his fingers. 

As he got older I would let him scoop it into empty egg cartons. 

The other day we put a bunch in a big plastic bag, added paint, he shook it up for a while (his favorite part) and then we laid it out on paper to dry in the sun. When it was done he had new blue rice and just changing the color made the whole activity fun and new again.

This day I decided to bury some puff balls in it and gave him some utensils to dig it out with and some bowls to separate it into. 

We also have these wooden scoops that I ordered on etsy that I added after he woke up. They are his favorite because they are just his size (think bath salt size). 

Quick and easy is the name of the game for us lately as Cruz looses interest quickly. 

I'm just going to say rice, rice baby one more time. 

Tattoo

Do you have them? Do you want them?

I dont, but want them in the worst way.

(okay, I actually do have one. I got it once when I was drunk down on Haight and Ashbury. Good memories. Mediocre tattoo. Anyways its so small that I never really count it)

I always think they are beautiful, but struggle with deciding on something I want. While I love that people get them just for the art, I've always been one to want meaning behind it (save the Haight experience. Silly, drunk, hippie girls).

via

Too Early?

I am just ridiculously excited.

via

And take them to impromptu music festivals in their diapers.

Learning to Love the Fool

Oh what a tough little week we had.

Cruz spent his first night at Papa's (and first ever away from Mama) on Friday night. While I knew it would be hard, I had no idea how much it would hurt. Had it only been a one time occasion I might have greatly enjoyed it. Knowing that it was soon to become a consistent thing shook me hard.

I made a very firm and conscious decision that upon my return to blogging after a brief hiatus, I didn't want to blog like I had in the past. I didn't, and don't, want to have a whole blog filled with series of posts about struggles and sadness. But I would be lying if I tried to pretend I didn't have them.

Being without my little guy is hard and I wouldn't wish that hardship on my worst enemy.

But I chose, and choose, to live in the moment and look to the future. Not to dwell on the things that I can not make different. I try very hard to be strong and positive, but at the same time be sensitive with myself and make sure that I am allowing myself to feel my real feelings and deal with them instead of pushing them away.

I sometimes feel like I take things harder then I should. I know Papa misses Cruz when he's not with him, but its not crippling to him the way it is to me. I see women everyday who enjoy the freedom of sending their children to their fathers for the weekend and then welcoming them home lovingly. They don't seem incapacitated the way that I feel I am when Cruz is gone. I wonder if I am too attached? Am I (overly) over-protective, do I rely too much on my role as a mother that I don't foster and value my other roles enough. Do other people think I am so crazily obsessed with my baby that I can't enjoy life without him around. 

I can go round and round with myself. But then I remember that it doesn't matter what I think others see me as. It doesn't matter if I feel differently about something then the next person or the person after that. My feelings are valid because they are my own, real and true. And when you live your truth no one can question it.

"I must learn to love the fool in me. The one who feels too much, talks too much, takes too many chances, wins sometimes and looses often, lacks self-control, loves and hates, hurts and gets hurt, promises and breaks promises, laughs and cries. It alone protects me against the utterly self-controlled, masterful tyrant whom I also harbor and who would rob me of human aliveness, humility, and dignity but for my fool."

Theodore I. Rubin

Ice Ice Baby

Currently, baths are not to be had around here without some kind of color involved. 

Last week it was watercolors and paintbrushes.

This week, colored ice cubes. 

And what a big hit it has been. 

What started out as a highchair activity....

quickly carried over to the tub.

Exploration

 became experimentation.

And finally some oral investigation. 

Oh my, how I love this little boy (and that little nakee booty).