Ready for 2015

I was digging through old blog posts on my phone and it looks like I rolled my 2013 resolutions over for 2014. They were pretty good resolutions and worth having for 2 years.

Jason and I went on 24 dates -- one every month. I'm definitely going to keep that one. I may not have ended up working out 3 times every week (especially not lately), but think that running a half marathon was a pretty good accomplishment. I'm seriously considering running another one in 2015. And I think we did a pretty good job getting Molly home from school early as often as we could. My day working from home next year will give us a little extra time, so I should be covered there.

So what to do next year? I have some thoughts. One is to take Molly to a new park every month. We can explore some of the local parks we haven't been to yet and maybe also some of the big parks in Chicago. Another resolution I'd like to make is to pack my lunch at least twice a week. Have I made this one before? I have trouble remembering to do it for some reason.

Instead of setting an overall fitness goal, I think I may just try to do sit ups 3 times a week. And instead of taking on any big house projects, I'd like to focus on one room every month, to get rid of any stuff we don't need, and add little touches like pillows and pictures and knick knacks.

I'm looking forward to 2015. I think it's going to be a good year. I'm excited about my new schedule. Molly is going to be turning 5 and starting kindergarten. Jason and I are planning to get out of the country for a vacation to Spain. What else could be in store?

Merry Christmas from O'Gradyland!

We've been on vacation for almost a week now and Molly has enjoyed every single second of it. I, unfortunately, was sick for a few days in the middle, but am back in action now and ready to enjoy the last few days of freedom!

This is probably the best possible place for me to be sick, because Molly has a full fan club ready and waiting to keep her entertained. I am pretty far down the list of favorites when we're here (seriously, I'm at the end)...but that's okay. I'm happy she has so much fun with her uncles, Aunt Corinne, and grandparents, playing hide and seek, dancing, laughing, and learning all about Superheroes, Star Wars, and The Ninja Turtles. Valuable knowledge she can take back to her friends at school :)

Here's a quick photo recap of our trip so far:

Our first stop was Roanoke, VA (Star City) to visit Uncle Joe

Selfie with Joe and Jon  on our Roanoke Star excursion -- the world's largest man-made illuminated star!

Making bead bracelets with Grandma

Back to Danville, VA -- making Christmas cookies with Uncle Joe

Decorating Christmas cookies with Uncle Jon

Opening presents from each other on Christmas Eve
(O'Grady tradition...Christmas Day is for Santa presents)

The brothers all received adult-sized Underoos. Ha! Jason is He-Man...my favorite

Molly digging into her stocking on Christmas morning

Can you feel the excitement?

Pure joy

The best part is that we still have a long weekend left. We'll probably see a movie today (another O'Grady tradition...the girls are going to see Into the Woods). Jason and I have a date night tomorrow (assuming I feel better, but I'm pretty sure I'm on the mend). And then we still have Saturday and part of Sunday to relax.

Merry Christmas to all. I hope wherever you are, your holiday is as happy as ours!

P.S. This will be my last time posting from Danville, VA...the O'Gradys are moving to Colorado Springs in Feb!

The best gift

There's a new baby in the family! Meet Evan James, my new precious nephew:

Brand new and looking blonde, just like his brother

Awww. Jeremy with his 2 boys. Saying "hi" for the first time

Evan is in Denver, so Jason, Molly, and I won't get to hold him until we visit. But hopefully that's SOON! Congratulations to Jeremy, Megan, and Will on the new adorable addition to your family!

So thankful

2014 has been excellent so far. Molly is happy, we're all healthy, and the family continues to grow, with George arriving this August and another new nephew coming soon in Denver. Molly and James are really starting to play well together, which is so much fun to watch. And we were extra lucky this year to have my Aunt Suzie up from Florida and Archie's parents to join us for the holiday. Here are the best pics from Thanksgiving break with the family:

Pumpkin pie party at school

Sus with George, looking sweet in one of Molly's old outfits 

Two Aunt Susies and a George

Archie and B -- thanks for hosting!

Best we could get with Grandma, Grandpa, and the big kids

Handsome George

Go Wildcats!

Cousins enjoying the game. Unfortunately, Northwestern did not win...no bowl game for us this year :(

Neck wear

I've been a knitting fool so far this winter. It gives me something productive to do while watching TV -- and something else to look at during the scary parts of Walking Dead! Here are a few of my latest creations:

A scarf for Molly -- she helped me out by cutting the fringe

Selfie in the cowl I knit for Susie. I also knit a cream one for B and a black one for me

Make way for ducklings

I had intended to write a long post about our weekend in Boston, but my little duckling has been sick and I'm exhausted. So here are the pics from the weekend. Hopefully you can see that we had a wonderful (but cold!) trip to Boston.

Visiting the Make Way for Ducklings statues at the Public Garden. This is moments after Molly dropped her full cup of hot chocolate on the sidewalk and burst into tears. She seems to have recovered nicely

Family pic in front of the lagoon. We stopped traffic on the bridge for at least a minute, but no one seemed to care. 

Having fun with Carly, our hotel's Canine Ambassador

Taking a break at the Boston Public Library

About to take a Duck Tour around the city

Our tour guide even let Molly drive the boat for a couple of the minutes. Look at that face! Pure joy.

We didn't get to do quite as much sightseeing as I had hoped, due to the weather. Guess that just means we'll have to go back in the Spring!

Presenting...us!

Last week, we were the featured "family of the week" at Molly's school, which basically just meant we had to present a poster about our family to the class. It was pretty fun to make the poster. We printed out a bunch of our favorite pictures and pointed out our favorite places to travel on a map.

Molly was VERY excited to show off the picture of our family at Disney World. She also had fun telling her class about her cousins and grandparents, especially her Papa Steve, who is so funny and calls her "George."

Thankfully, Molly does not seem to have my fear of public speaking. She took over the presentation and hardly let us get a word in edgewise! I tried to channel her energy the next day when I had to present doomed video concepts to my client. Unfortunately, it did not go quite as well as the talk at Molly's school:

All about the O'Gradys

A little dose of George

I was scrolling through the blog and realized I haven't posted pics of my little nephew George since he was born. Poor second child! George is a super sweet baby. He's still in that wonderful phase where he'll just sack out and sleep on your chest for as long as you'll let him. We're all pretty smitten. Can't believe he's almost 3 months old now and about to start daycare with Molly and James!

He smiles!

Cable girl

Molly looooves watching TV. Is it any surprise? She IS my daughter and I have logged some serious hours over the years. But we needed an easy way to pry her away from marathon sessions of My Little Pony on Sunday afternoons. Enter the ticket system.

By eating her dinner, cleaning up her toys, or just randomly being a good kid, Molly can earn tickets for TV shows, movies, or You Tube / Netflix sessions. She has to have a ticket if she wants to watch. So far, it's going pretty well! She hasn't really figured out how to stockpile her tickets, so it's pretty much been one ticket in, one ticket out. The only problem is when Molly has a ticket, but I need to deny her access for whatever reason (bedtime, bathtime, dinnertime, etc). She'll whine a little bit, but overall, it's been easier than the pre-ticket era.

Hopefully we can keep this up though the winter, when I know our default mode will be to curl up on the couch in front of the tube!

Someone has been pretty good lately... 

Boo!

Happy Halloween! Or should I say, Happy Elsa Day?!

This might be Molly's favorite holiday.

New favorite pose? Yours truly carved the pumpkin.

In costume at the Evanston Fairy Tale Trail last weekend. Molly was obsessed with this teen Elsa's braces. 

Unfortunately, the weather is less than ideal for trick or treating. It's 38 degrees and extremely windy. Boo indeed!

Making plans

What have we been up to lately? Oh, just plotting and scheming ways to have fun and get away from life for a while.

On Saturday, we're having a party. An adults party. A real party with all of Jason's friends, good food, loud music, and every kind of beverage you can imagine. I can't wait. We're planning to pack the house and stay up way past our bedtime. Or, at least as late as our friends can stay out before having to go home and relieve their babysitters :) Molly is going to have a slumber party with her Aunt Susie, so Jason and I can be irresponsible and sleep in late.

Then, in a couple of weeks, Molly and I will be off to Boston to join Jason on a work trip. It's been a while since we've done something like that. But when I heard he had to travel for a full week, including two weekends, I thought it might be fun to tag along for a couple of days. If anyone has any good ideas for what to do with kids in Boston, please let me know! Molly and I will be on our own for most of the weekend and I'm sure there's only so much shopping and Freedom Trail walking she will be willing to do.

The last big thing we're planning (other than the holidays of course) is a trip to Spain in 2015. We were hoping for Spring, but I don't think the timing is going to work out, so Summer it is. We're aiming for June, when my parents will be around to babysit, and Jason's parents will also be free to fly in and help out for a few days. We'll need the help because we're planning a long, glorious vacation of at least 10 days.

We definitely have some time to plan the trip, but want to try to spend time in Barcelona, Madrid, Grenada, and Seville.

It doesn't seem like that long since Jason and I went to Ireland, but I think we took that trip in 2006. I think it's time to get another stamp in the passport. Better make sure those things aren't expired!

Family rivalry

It's always a little bit stressful but lots of fun when Nebraska comes to town to play Northwestern. Although I don't like having to cheer against Jason's favorite team, I love having our Nebraska family members come visit! This year, we were lucky enough to have Jason's parents, his brother Joe, his Uncle Tom, his cousins Emma and Tori, and their boyfriends, Ben and Philip, in Evanston for the game. I made sure Susie, Sean, and Sean's dad, Joe, also attended our tailgate to help balance out the red with a little purple.

This year, the Huskers won 38-17 -- it was close until the Wildcats, in typical fashion, fell apart in the fourth quarter. But the two teams have started to establish a little bit of a rivalry since Nebraska joined the Big Ten. I'm looking forward to a Northwestern payback victory next year in Lincoln!

And now...pics from the weekend:

Striking a pose on their way to the park. Molly loves her Uncle Joe!

From left: Uncle Tom, Joe R (an NU fan, despite the red coat!), me, Jas, Ben, Joe O'G, Cousin Tori, Philip, Cousin Emma, G'ma Marsha, G'pa Steve, Molly, Aunt Susie, and Uncle Sean 

Family selfie at the stadium -- Marsha, Joe, Tom, Steve, and Molly (wearing Steve's glasses)

Jas and me...when we were both still happy. This picture was taken when the score was 7-7

And now for some soccer shots. Team pic with 6 of 8 Silver Bears

Coach Jason and Molls

Post-game fun at the park

I feel weak

Up until a few weeks ago, Molly was all set for Halloween. She was planning to dress up as Merida, the Scottish princess from the Disney movie Brave. We already had the costume at home and she looked so perfect in it with her red hair.

I should have known it wasn't going to be that easy. All of a sudden, Molly started telling people she was going to dress up as Rapunzel. And then she started her campaign for Elsa. 

I'm assuming everyone knows who Elsa is, but if not, she's one of the princesses from the movie of all movies, Frozen. She has long blonde hair and special powers. I think half the girls in Molly's class are planning to dress as Elsa for Halloween. 

For some reason, I was opposed to jumping on the Elsa bandwagon. I kept trying to sell Molly on dresses we already had at home. And then I started my own campaign to get her to go as a fairy. I figured it would be easy, just pick up a pair of wings and a wand. 

But then we were at Target and the Elsa dress was on sale... for only $4 more than the wing / wand combo I was pushing. Molly was so excited when she saw the Elsa dress and clearly not impressed by the wings. So I caved. What's a mom to do? 

I'm so conflicted! On the one hand, I don't want Molly to think she can just get whatever she wants. But on the other hand, there's something special about Halloween and getting to pick out your costume. Sigh. It's done, and she's thrilled (sweetly appreciative, not bratty), but I know I'm going to have to keep a close watch on things to make sure this little princess doesn't turn into a monster!

She looks happy and cute, but does she look spoiled? 

All done (for now)

Most people who read this blog probably know about our tile woes, so I won't get tooo far into the details. Basically, we've been waiting for our tile to show up since late April. It never came. We couldn't get answers, or a refund, so we finally ended up contesting the charges through our credit card company and finishing up the project with tile we bought off the shelf. Hurrah! Check it out:

Not exactly the tile of our dreams, but it still looks great and ended up being much less expensive. Huge improvement over the old cream vinyl :)

It's hard to get a good pic of such a small space, but you can see my favorite detail -- the light switch! -- it's no longer hidden behind the door

The pedestal sink really opens up the space. And I think the purple walls look SO much better than the baby blue

It feels really really good to have that project wrapped up, even though I was starting to get used to living among boxes of home improvement supplies. Now we can move on to some of the smaller details and finishing touches around the house. Maybe we'll even get around to hanging up some of the art that Jason has worked so hard to create!

Sweater season

Since my last knitting project took about 5 months to complete, I thought I'd get an earlier start this year. I picked a less complex project and thicker yarn and voila! I have a new sweater for the winter:

The cowl neck was a little too open for my liking, so I'm probably going to wear it pinned up at the shoulder. 

The weather is definitely starting to get cooler. It was about 40 degrees and rainy today, so we decided to watch the Northwestern game from the comfort of our home instead of shivering at the stadium. Maybe that was a good luck decision -- they beat Wisconsin! Go 'Cats!

Survival skills

Jason is traveling the next 9 straight work days, so I'm planning on doing whatever I can to make life a little easier for myself. I'm going to shower at night to make the morning routine a little less hectic (bad hair, who cares!). I'm planning on eating a random combination of leftovers, fridge items, and frozen food for dinner so I don't have to cook (my version of the raw diet). I've booked a babysitter for next Thursday night so I can go out for happy hour with my coworkers (I have a feeling I will need a little fun with friends to get through the next 2 weeks). And finally, I've worked with Molly to draw up a schedule that makes us both happy.

Molls does soooo much better when she knows what's coming. If we wait until the morning to pick out clothes, she'll want a pink dress and nothing but a pink dress and will refuse to put on anything until after breakfast. But if we talk about her outfit the night before and lay it out on the bed, there's a good chance she'll wake up and put it on without me even asking.

Same thing with deciding what to do after school. If I ask Molly in the car what she wants to do when we get home, she'll tell me she wants to watch TV. By the time we walk in the door, we'll still be negotiating what she can watch and when. But if we discuss an activity in the morning, she'll usually bring it up on her own after school and be excited about it.

So, Molly and I sat down this morning and made a plan for the rest of the week. I knew TV had to factor in there somewhere, so we started with a movie night. Easy. Tomorrow we'll paint and take a bath. She's even agreed to wear pants! And then on Thursday, we'll break out the stencils. Jason comes home Friday night, so I think we'll wait and see what he wants to do. Can't have a plan for every night :)

Our schedule for the week...we'll see how this works

Soccer mom

I better blog about this now...my time as a soccer mom might be limited :) We're three weeks in and have yet to see Molly dribble the ball or even really participate in the game. She has thrown the ball in from the sidelines a few times. But when every other kid is running after the ball, Molly is usually running to the other goal to be as far from the action as possible.

That said, I have loved sitting on the sidelines with the other parents, cheering on the Silver Bears (our team). And Jason has absolutely loved being a coach. Molly is still very young and has plenty of time to figure out how a team works and that playing soccer does not always involve sharing. She also needs to figure out how to get through a 20-minute game without taking a bathroom break!

Coach Jason and Molly

Action shot - a rare moment with Molly running in the same direction as her team

Mix and match

Some days, I think I am raising a miniature Punky Brewster. Or a tiny fashion diva. Molly has pretty strong opinions about what she will wear and usually ends up in a somewhat ridiculous looking mish mosh of layers.

She prefers pink, the more shades the better, unless of course the top or dress has spaghetti straps (what she calls "noodle straps"). In that case, any color or pattern is acceptable. Molly likes to show some skin.

Molly also likes skirts and dresses, but will consent to wearing leggings under a dress or skirt if it is cold. Leggings with sparkles are preferred. The thought of wearing jeans usually sends Molly to the floor in tears.

I am sick of having a closet full of adorable clothes that Molly will not wear, so this year, I am going to take her shopping at Kohls and Target and let her have fun picking out new clothes herself. We'll probably end up with characters on the front of every shirt or dress and tights in every color. Or, it could end up like the time I took her to the Gap and she only wanted one thing - neon pink ballet flats.

Whatever happens, I'll just go with it! She's learning to express herself and what I think is cute may just not be cool enough in her eyes. Sigh. I get it. Instead of fighting about clothes, maybe I can inspire Molly to channel her inner Project Runway!