9 months and 10-inches

Bad blogger, bad Mommy, bad daughter! Forgive me, it's been two weeks since my last post, but the days have just slipped away. I know I've said it before, but I honestly don't know where the time goes as the days fly by...except of course for those two hours before little Miss M's bed time, which I swear some days passes slower than our wait for referral. But truly we have been busy, busy, busy and that's my excuse for being a bad Mother in that not only have I not blogged but I haven't pulled out my camera to take any photos either. Don't despair though, pictures do appear later in this post as Deb of course came to my rescue and snapped some good ones as usual.

Here's a recap of the past two weeks and what's been keeping us so busy. As usual we've been attending our weekly Monday library play group and our Friday China play group. We've also attended numerous Moms Group activities and met up with friends for various play dates. I try to get Miss Maisie out of the house and involved in some activity with other children both mornings and afternoons but the weather has been in the triple digits with high humidity and pollution, so we've had to curtail most of our outdoor time and have spent many an afternoon at the indoor play ground with all the other Moms and children who are also avoiding the heat. Though Maisie loves the indoor playground I think we're both ready for a bit of a change so we're looking forward to the weather cooling down a bit and getting outside more.

Last Wednesday through Sunday my parents came for a visit and here's where I was both a bad Mother and daughter, I didn't take a single picture during their entire visit. Then again, I don't think they took any pictures either so bad all around. During their visit Eammon and I had our first night out together, in nine months, without Maisie. We enjoyed a nice, leisurely dinner at Yellow Fin...well not as leisurely as we wanted as the temp outside was over 100 and I swear that inside the restaurant it was just as hot if not hotter. Thus we opted not to indulge in dessert at the restaurant but instead headed to the local ice cream parlor where we knew it would be delightfully cool. Even though Maisie only met my parents during a brief day and a half visit way back in early February, she took to them right away. She enjoyed their company, gave them both lots of kisses and hugs, dragged them around by their fingers, delighted in all their attention and of course ran them ragged. Yep, Sunday morning my parents were up extra early and I'm positive I heard tires squealing as they drove off , burning rubber trying to get back to Florida and the relaxing life of retirement, golf and dinners without a 21 month old wearing them down.

I've been thinking about our upcoming trips and planning what we'll need. I still haven't gotten my head around the fact that we managed to go carry-on-only for almost three weeks in China, while contending with three different climates, yet now that we have a toddler we'll have to check luggage for a week at a beach! Then there's that fact that Maisie's a little monkey and with ease can climb out of a pack-and-play or a crib, thus at home her crib is tented so to keep her safe. With our upcoming travels of a week in Jamaica, a week in Utah and two weeks in Aruba my concern was about how I was going to keep her safe and contained at night. To get the tent on her crib properly, it takes a good amount of time and I really didn't want to have to take it on and off with each trip so I considered purchasing a second tent for travel. But then I remembered how rickety the cribs in Aruba always appeared and the cost to rent a crib in Jamaica is ridiculous, so after a bit of searching on the Internet I found what will hopefully be a perfect solution, Maisie's own Princess Peapod. I've had it set up in the family room since it arrived and she loves playing in it, zipping and unzipping the flaps and kissing me through the netting just like she does with her crib tent. Before we make our first trip I'll have her sleep in the Peapod a few times and I'm keeping everything crossed that she takes to it, loves it and bedtime when traveling won't be a huge issue.

So I have a secret to share. Maisie and I have a new man in our lives and he's just wonderful!! He's so intelligent, attractive, worldly, slim, savvy and always ready to offer wonderful suggestions of where to go, places to see and restaurants to try. Both Maisie and I love spending time and playing with him as he's so easy going and mild-mannered, he doesn't even mind us teasing him and pushing his buttons. He loves taking us to new places and in-fact will be tagging along and going to Utah with us. He's so decisive and never at a loss, I think Maisie and I are both in love with him. Before getting involved I talked to some people who have known him and they all spoke so highly about him and his abilities, one gal even raved about his accent and trust me I love a good accent as that was one of the things that really got me with Eammon, a nice English accent. I'm in love, he's the one a girl's dream come true and now he's mine, mine, mine!!

So I know that by now you're asking, what's with the title of this post and where the heck are the Maisie pics?? Hold your horses, the pictures are just a little bit further down this post. First let's talk about the title of this post. Back last November, Thanksgiving week, I went and had my hair cut. No biggie, nothing unusual, nothing new or different, just my usual cut to get me though a few months until the next time. We then traveled to China in December and since then life has been all about Maisie. In the eight months that Maisie has been with us she has not been fed, diapered, put to bed by or woken up to anyone other than Eammon or I. That all changed last week when my parents were here and they got her up from a nap and watched her one day while I went out for a quick shopping trip and they of course were here while Maisie slept, the night Eammon and I went out for dinner. Maisie did great waking from her nap to someone other than Eammon or I and there was no winging, complaining, anxiety or rebound sleep issues, she just went with the flow. Being in her own home and comfort zone was one thing but then yesterday I took her to her friend Ava's home and after dropping her off, handing her diaper bag to Ava's Mom and kissing Maisie goodbye, I headed to the salon where nine months earlier I had last had a haircut. Let me tell you, my hair sure grew a lot in nine months and where it's thick and curly there was more hair than I could manage. A change was needed and a decision was made. A ponytail ten inches in length was taken off and today that ponytail of hair was mailed off to Locks of Love. I love my new short do and am pleased that my abundance of extra hair is going to a good cause. Even though Eammon loves long hair and wasn't too pleased to hear that it was going to be cut short, he thinks the new cut is cute and was totally on board when he heard what I was doing with my long hair.

Back in June I mentioned that we had some big projects that were going to be done around the house. When we moved into this house, we knew there were many things that needed to be done: replacing the polybutylene plumbing (done), New kitchen & bar area (done), new flooring throughout the home (done downstairs), three new a/c systems (done), full interior paint job (3 rooms remaining), installing additional attic ventilation, rebuilding the deck and dock and redoing all four bathrooms. Over the past few weeks we've had our deck and dock rebuilt and other than it needing to be sealed in a few weeks, it's completed. The big issue with our property is that it extends into the pond and we're not allowed to fence what backyard we do have, but I wanted to make at least some of our backyard safe for Maisie where I didn't have to worry quite as much about her falling into the water or running off at top speed. We have a covered patio which runs about 45-feet along the back of our home. Adjacent to the patio was an old, dangerous, no-where-near-any-code-ever, falling down and splinter ridden deck with steps of odd heights and lengths leading down to a dock. We decided to have the deck and dock rebuilt and enlarged with a ramp leading from the deck to the dock and then we'd have the railing run from the corner of our home, along the side of the patio, the side of the deck, the front of the deck, down the ramp, all around the dock and back up the ramp to the other side of the patio to the house, completely enclosing the patio, deck, dock and ramp. Now between the patio, deck, dock and ramp we have just over one thousand square feet of contained play area known as Maisieland. She has her playhouse and playground out there and we've been out every morning before it gets too hot and she loves it. Of course though, with all the wonderful playthings out there, her favorite is kicking her ball up and down the ramp over and over and over.

Finally the pictures, there are before and after pics of the project that I took.

The patio, house and all the new wood still has to be power washed so it's still a bit of a mess out there but that didn't stop Deb and LiLi from coming yesterday to play at Maisieland and of course Deb took all the good piccies of the girls, enjoy.