Stealing Time..

Ethan's driving me bonkers tonight, so I'm giving myself a time out to post these pages I've recently done.. Other than that, nothing exciting has happened.. We're going to Deanna Rose Farm tomorrow, though.. So that should be fun.. :)

This one is with a kit I designed with another girl who used to be a costume designer.. Very fun, and I'm guessing I'll be doing many more pages with it.. :) 

Another kit I designed - this is the boys at the sprinkler park {splash pad} last summer..

Photos from last week..

. . . and counting . . .

Alec has been at the school going on 37 hours working on his show.. He came home for a quick dinner last night, then again after rehearsal for about half an hour just to take a little break and get recharged.. I feel so bad for him.. I've pulled my share of all-nighters, but I don't think I've ever gone this long.. Also, Ethan did not nap today, and despite it all, today was actually a really good day.. He let me work on my laptop for a couple hours while he colored, watched tv, played in the office, etc, so I don't feel quite as gipped as I otherwise would.. Here are a few pictures from today and yesterday..  {I don't know why they're so blurry here - you can click on them for a better image..}

At the park yesterday.. we actually played out in the grass with this stick for most of the time... it was really nice to just sit and not have to chase him from one piece of equipment to the next, lol. 

This was the first time I've EVER been able to get him to "smile for the camera"..
Good thing he likes cheese so much.. :D

His favorite activity these days.. No matter what we do to lock it, he always figures it out..
{and no - our fridge is not empty, he's just crammed it all onto the top shelf}  

Wearing his "hat"

He found some of Alec's shoes and socks and insisted on wearing them.. whatever.. 

 I did get him to blow a kiss, though...
I can tell this is just the beginning of many more photo shoots to come..  :D

I know you probably won't see this, Alec, but we love you and miss you and hope you'll be home soon.. :D

Easter

Yeah - I'm a week late.. Whatever.. :D

So - Easter - not your typical celebration this year, but that's okay.. We still had fun.. :D  We started off the morning going to the church to watch conference.. That was fine for about the first hour.. Then Ethan just turned into a crazy person, so Alec and I were taking turns being out in the hall with him.. Finally, we decided neither one of us was getting anything out of it, so we left.. We had been planning on eating lunch with the ward in between sessions, so I don't even remember what we had, but it wasn't anything special - just something we threw together really fast.. After a quick lunch, we put the bug down for a nap while Alec and I listened to the rest online..  Luckily, it was a long nap, so we were able to listen to most of the second session as well.. :)  

In between sessions, we prepared a little easter egg hunt for Ethan in the living room and sun room, so as soon as he woke up, that's what we did..

The goodies.. {Thanks Mom & Dad for supplementing}

The hunt {and don't ask why I did Easter pics in bw, but I started messing around with one to fix the fact that it was out of focus and liked it so well, I did the whole batch..}

It's kind of hard to tell here, but he's holding like 3 or 4 eggs..

It took him a while to realize he could put them in his basket, so it made
collecting them a little tricky.. 

Relishing in the haul.. 

Didn't you know dripping caramel is the new black?
{click for a better view}

Then we proceeded to dye some eggs...  Alec had been gone all day on Saturday, and since we did candy for the egg hunt, it didn't matter what order we did things in..

His favorite part was dropping the eggs in the cups..

It's tense work taking them out.. 

Not a particularly interesting photo, but I love the exchange between their facial expressions.. 

He sure loves his daddy.. 

After egg dying, we decided to enjoy the weather and drove to a park down by the school to go look at the ducks.. It was nice to get out and Ethan loved running around totally free.. All in all - I'd say it was a great Easter!  :D

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This picture is totally unrelated to anything, but I love it!

This is SUCH a rare occasion for a couple reasons.. 

1. Ethan hates blankets, and refuses to use them - even to sleep during the dead of winter.. The only thing he thinks they're good for is to play peek-a-boo.. He won't even let Alec or me use a blanket - and I'm always cold, so that is particularly frustrating.. 
2. Ethan and Sasha are coexisting in the same space without trying to beat each other up.. It's a love/hate relationship - Ethan just has an odd way of showing it..
3. Everybody actually stayed there long enough for me to find the camera!  :D

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In other news - since we're here, and all...  Alec and I have finally landed on what we're going to do with ourselves once he graduates.. We actually did a couple weeks ago, but I'm a bad blogger - no secret there.. Anyway - he applied to several university jobs, and was turned down for all of them, although he did have an interview with one, so that was encouraging.. He's kind of been thinking about this for a while, and I've been pretending he's not serious, but over USITT he met back up with several "contacts" in "the biz" and got some really great encouragement, re-vamped some relationships, and was pushed over the limit.. 

The plan?  We're going to move to New York!  Eek!  I'm excited and supportive - although it did take a while to accept the fact that we won't have "steady" income lined up, which means no buying a house anytime soon, and most likely no insurance {still} for at least another year - sigh.  BUT - now that I'm over that, and know how passionately he feels about this, I'm behind it 100%..  Like I said, he doesn't have anything specific lined up right now, but he's been in touch with several people at a company in Yonkers that he's hoping to at least get some amount of work with.. What's great about that is that we'd be out of the city - about 30 minutes - but still close enough and with enough flexibility that he could go in and work on shows on the side as well.. He knows some really great and pretty successful designers - on all levels - and they've all told him to stay in touch and let them know when he gets there because they're sure they'll have something for him.. So... that's the plan.. Oy - still kind of makes me a little nervous, because I know how HARD it will be, but that's okay.. :D

We're not sure, yet, when we'll leave, but it will most likely be in July sometime.. He'll either be working the Shakespeare in the park here again - which he did last year - and that ends the first week of July or so, OR he might go work at a dance roadhouse in Boston which would end sometime the end of July {another contact he made at USITT}..  So, I've been doing a bit of researching about housing with that in mind, but if you have any recommendations on where specifically to live, feel free to hand them over.. :)  

So - that's what's new with us.. Hope you enjoyed it.. :D

My husband wins all the brownies!

Alec is so good to me.  He's in crunch time right now getting ready for a show to tech next week, and between that and USITT he's basically only been home long enough to sleep 4-5 hours each night every day for the last two weeks.  It's been taking quite a toll on Ethan and I.. Ethan's become quite the little terror - running around like a crazy person, needing all sorts of extra attention, being kind of violent - kicking, throwing, pinching, etc - and he still hasn't quite gotten back on track with his naps..  I would like to think that I'm handling it a bit better than he is, but I'm probably not.. So after I put him down last night, I came back to the computer and saw an email from Alec titled, "This is a Gift - Unwrap It."  I, of course, proceeded to open the email.  In it, he told me that he had arranged for a sitter for 3 hours today, and that I could have the car to go do whatever I wanted wherever I wanted!  Seriously - does it get any better than that?  I think not! 

So - today came, and I was so happy when Melody got here at noon.. We packed Ethan up and she took him to the park where he was fitfully worn out.  I, in the meantime, had a yummy scrummy surprise lunch date with Alec at Panera then dropped him off at the school and headed to the library - a quiet place with a beautiful view and free wi-fi.  I spent the rest of my time just scrapping, messing around online, and having a totally carefree time.  And what's better - after two long hours at the park, and some time playing at home, Ethan when straight down for a nap as soon as I walked in the door - double score!  

Now tell me - is that not impressive for him to come up with all by himself?  Probably the sweetest thing he's done for me.  Ever.  Thanks, babe - I owe you big time!  :D 

Where Has All the Time Gone?!?!

My goodness!  You finish one project and vow to spend more time on others and somehow manage to mess it up completely.. Ah well... what can you do?  :D

A quick recap of what we've been doing the last month and a half..

Alec

• Took a nasty spill on the ice about a month ago - he was holding Ethan, and managed to twist his body around so the bug landed on top of him instead of under him.  However, that meant he landed right on his ribcage...  He was in some serious pain for about a week, and it seemed to be getting worse, so we eventually had it x-rayed.. Nothing showed up, so he went on a steady diet of ibuprofen and is just now being able to go throughout the day without some sort of pain..
• Has started working full time on the last show of his grad career, Train to 2010.  This is the show he went to South Africa last year to workshop.. As far as anyone is concerned, it won't be mounting in SA anymore, but it's still slated to go to The Crossroads Theatre in NJ sometime next year.
• Spent this last week at the USITT conference which was held in KC.  {Basically all the theatre techies get together to show off their cool toys and techniques.}  He made and reestablished some contacts that will hopefully lead to some work for him in the very near future.. more on that momentarily.. I even got in on the action, for a brief moment, to meet up with some friends from USU for dinner one night.. It was so nice to get out and see some familiar faces.. much needed, for sure!  :D

Ethan

• Wow!  So much!  He is learning SO quickly!  He can count to 3, and also recognizes other numbers as well.. Knows circles, triangles, squares, diamonds, hearts, stars, yellow, pink, white, black, orange, green, and usually blue, brown & purple - we're still working on red.  I've lost count of how many words he knows, but he strung two together for the first time last night and said "Bye bye, Daddy."  Too cute!  :D  
• Right around the time change, he started an AWFUL phase of not sleeping.. He would refuse to go to bed until 10 or 11 at night - sometimes as late as 12 or 1, then he'd be up again at 4 or 5 - sometimes for the day.. And he wasn't napping, either.. Seriously.. we just couldn't take it!  I don't know what happened or changed, but finally these last few days he's gotten back on track.. His schedule has changed a bit, so he's napping later and longer than normal 3-6-ish but then he'll ASK to go to sleep right around 8:30 or 9 each night and sleep until 7:30 or so in the morning.. MUCH more manageable for everyone involved!  ;)
• We've also been spending more time outside lately with the warmer weather - minus the random day last weekend when we got 9 inches of snow in between 2 days of 60+ weather.. It's so fun to see him running around by himself and making choices of what to do and where to go.. He's such a grown up boy now - and SO independent {not sure where he gets that from} I see lots of fun and exciting times for us this summer.. 
• His imagination is really expanding, too.. Last week he asked me to draw a plate on his magnidoodle, then he proceeded to "eat" food off of it.. Such a silly boy.. :)
• His OCD is also expanding.. oy.. He's obsessed with putting things "away" - he'll walk through the house and point at things and say "away, away" until I put it away or help him put it away.  It's a good habit, though, and I love that he wants to put his toys away before bed.. :D  He also insists on all doors being closed all the time - something I appreciate - especially when it comes to the cupboards - but it's also cute when he wakes up in the morning and proceeds to close his door before coming out...

Amber

• Still just scrapping away.. Designing is going well, and I really love working with that.. I haven't been doing a whole lot of pages since the last post, as I've been trying to catch up on designing.. In the digiscrap world, people really only buy stuff when it's new, so if you're not putting out new product, you're not taking in any cash...
• Speaking of new products.... something I've just started offering is custom blogwear - aka make your blog look pretty using the kits I've designed.. And I kind of have a little favor to ask.. I would love to give links to some of my work in the product description in the shop so people can see what I'm capable of.. If you're willing to let me post a link to your blog in a public digiscrap store, I'd love to do a blog design for you.. If you're interested, email me at stolenmomentsdesign AT gmail DOT com, and I'll get you more info.. :D

And now that this post has been far too long, I'm going to end.. But I PROMISE that I'll post more later with pictures and details of our Easter excitement in the next few days or so.. :D