it aches.

oh dear. we are watching max stretch out before our very eyes, and become less and less baby....and as thrilling and exciting as it it, it makes my heart hurt just a little bit. He has changed so much in a week's time, my head is spinning. Really? Let me show ya...

and then there's this... if you need to click on the picture to get a better view of that tooth down there, please do.

As if mastering his sippy-cup this week wasn't enough, he went ahead with this today:

And you can go right on ahead and call me crazy, but my SEVEN MONTH OLD is starting to call me mom. I spend every waking second with the boy, know every facial expression and mannerism. And this is different...is starting to become intentional. When he's getting tired or hungry, he'll crawl his way over to me, pull on my pant leg and wimper, "Mum!"

I melt. I die. He could ask me for the keys to my car right now, and I would not deny him. I am his, totally. I am thrilled at everything he is learning and doing, but oh Max. Please stop growing up so fast!!

We are, indeed, going to be living in downtown Portland for six weeks...from the second half of May thru June. That'll be fun to explore a new town, and get out to the Oregon coast a couple of times! I hope to have all my friends down to visit us, and look forward to sunny warm weather!
Also in May, the three of us are flying out to Chicago to watch my littlest brother graduate from college! (Let me say, that both of my amazing bros are graduating, Josiah from undergrad, and David from harvard graduate school, and we WISH so badly we could go to both! So proud of both of you!!!) We are excited to be in the chicago area for a couple of days, see some dear friends, have all of our family together for the first time in forever....and then Jon will have to depart for a business trip, and Max & I will head up to Wisconsin for a few more days. My little guy is the biggest trooper in car rides, and I really hope that driving the 3 hours alone with him to Wisconsin is no exception :) I'm so excited to be with family again. Time away flies by too fast!
I feel like I have just so much to look forward to, actually. Soccer starts up again this weekend, on St. Patty's day...we have a babysitter and everything (thanks, Rachel!!!!) Stay tuned for pictures of our crazy group in glittery-green garb.The whole Binder fam is coming to town for Amy's birthday, and I'm so excited to see them, and for them all to meet my kiddo! Plus, we have another babysitter lined up (thanks, Cindy!!!!) and we're all going to the hunger games!! Yes, I'm over-the-top excited for that.Then at the end of the month my brother in law is graduating from police academy! WAHOO!!! THEN, my Aunt Sharon, and cousins Jackie & Allison are coming to town for five days!!!!
I've always been the kind of person to live my life in anticipation of things. I count down for nearly everything. And I know that it leaves me in the dangerous spot of never enjoying the moment, but I really AM enjoying life at the moment. I am just so excited for everything coming down the line too :)
This morning before Jon left for work, he so sweetly told me not to worry about dinner tonight, and that we would bring home thai food for us.So when he walked in the door tonight with no take-out bags in hand, I asked him what happened. Where was the thai food that I, honestly, had spent all day anticipating and started to crave?? He stared at me in COMPLETE bewilderment, having absolutely no idea what I was talking about. I stared back at him in complete bewilderment like, "Are you kidding me? You promised me thai food tonight." We went back and forth a couple of times, before I realized that I had DREAMED the whole thing this morning. For serious. I woke up this morning, feeling strange after having some of the most realistic dreams in the world (dreamt that my landlord broke in while max & I were still sleeping and had remodeled/rearranged my entire kitchen, and I was LIVID...and I felt kind of unsafe...it was weird.) and for whatever reason, I dreamed that Jon tenderly asked me to take a night off from cooking. Hahaha, oh lord. You can imagine how hard we laughed about that. I proceeded to put Max down to bed, and make a run for thai take-out, because I was so let down by the whole thing.
ha. anyways...