Goooooal!, Jasper's Haircut and Other Kid Pictures

Obviously, I was suffering from post-BlogHer stress syndrome this week and couldn't manage to get a Wordless Wednesday post up. This is a condolence post for those of you who simply cannot go a week without scads of pictures of my beauteous kiddos. Hi, Dad!



Taking the kids to Sam's the day after returning from such a whirlwind trip was enough to put me on high blood pressure medicine. No joke! They may look sweet but these two are devil spawn. I blame Bob.



They're much easier to deal with when untethered in the wild. I got them this mini soccer goal set to try and wear them out. Roo likes the trash talking element of sports while Jasper prefers kicking balls into poison ivy. Score!




Sometimes Jasper likes to up his cuteness factor by getting as close as possible to any of our six cats. T. Rex is probably the most tolerant, although Chunk lets Roo lead him on a leash like a puppy. I think Rex feels like Jasper is his twin. They have very similar personalities, both wanting to be stroked and adored constantly. And both have crazy, sweaty bedhead.




One day, Jasper had sweet blondish flyaway curls (okay, there was a serious dreadlock thing going on in the back) and then suddenly…



…he is all grown up! Maybe he'll be able to keep up with that pesky Roo now. There's gonna be trouble, people.



The weather has been unusually mild since and I appreciate the reprieve since August in Kansas usually feels like living in a convection oven. It's been really great being able to hang out in the backyard without melting. Idyllic, even. Roo likes to blow bubbles and Jasper likes to chase them. It's really a win-win situation for me.






I love this sea bird that Bob made out of old license plates for the upcoming Horn Island show at MCA. Surprisingly graceful swaying from the crabapple tree.

Smooshies!

Smooshies are plush toys that allow your child to mix and match different crazy limbs and hair and facial features to create their own unique monster. Or alien. Or robot. Or animal. The only limit to what Smooshies can be is your imagination!



Roo and Jasper were both immediately captivated by the bright colors and soft fabrics of the Smooshies. We only received one to review so I actually had to make them take turns playing with it!



Roo liked putting the Smooshie together, while Jasper was more interested in taking it apart. The velcro makes it easy to do both although I think for younger kids it might be better to have bigger velcro flaps, especially for the skinny arms and legs which were a little more tricky to adhere perfectly. They're a great size for kids to tote around and cuddle with and the price is definitely appealing: bodies run $5.99 and additional parts are just $1.99 exclusively at JoAnn.com. My kids had the various appendages strewn all over the house in a matter of minutes!, so the one thing I would like to see with future Smooshies would be a way to contain all the parts- either via a self-contained pocket inside the body or a separate bag.



Roo thought these pink lips looked better on the backside of the Smooshie because she's five and nothing is funnier to a pre-kindergartner than butts… except maybe farts. (Thankfully, Smooshies haven't expanded into a smelly range of accessories yet.) I have to admit that it does make a fetching butt-ruffle effect.



One2One Network supplied us with the Smooshie pictured to facilitate this review. We also have the chance to win a gift card by writing about this toy. Just so you know.

BlogHer: Mostly Awesome

Hands-down, the best thing about BlogHer was the opportunity to meet other bloggers. Specifically, my girls Kathleen and Candice who got to witness just how frickin' long it takes me to get ready to go anywhere. And I think they still like me, anyway. (This picture is from the EyeFiCard BowlHer Flickr stream. Yes, I owned all of those clothing items before I heard of this event.)



I got to mingle with lots of fabulous bloggers, some famous and some not-so-famous, and it was good to realize that we're all pretty much geeks who like to write and/or take pictures. The Shutter Sisters were incredibly gracious in sharing their knowledge and interest of all things photographic and apparently I really need a Nikon D50. Aside from snazzy DSLR cameras that dangled like jewelry from many blogger's necks, my most-coveted item from BlogHer was the Yudu screenprinting machine. It looks easy and relatively economical to use and you can create tons of cool stuff. Way more fun than this photo of Gabrielle would lead you to believe…



I attended several of the panels, although some of my favorites were "Room of Your Own" sessions. Identity/Passions: Enough About You...Who's Reading You? featured an interesting quartet of bloggers (Laura Roeder, Twanna Hines, Ree Drummond and Susan Getgood) discussing readership, community and privacy issues. Totally interesting and I got to give Ree (Pioneer Woman, y'all!!!) some Chicken PooP so I was thrilled. Plus, I turned around during the session and noticed Gudrun sitting behind me... we'd been partners in a gift swap a while back, so it was a crazy coincidence. The kind that seems to happen a lot at BlogHer.



There were celebrity chefs to ogle, like Paula Deen (I couldn't get anywhere close to take a pic with my point-and-shoot) and Rick Bayless:



Listening to the crowd talk about Carson Kressley was almost as entertaining as listening to Carson Kressley talk. I geeked out and didn't even have my photo taken with him so I was happy to come across this one. (This picture is from the BabyJiDesign Flickr stream.) Even though I am smirking and bizarrely tan. Much like Carson, himself, I guess.



Staying in a hotel was nice. Comfy beds, luxurious bedding, the ability to crank the air to like 35º. Thank goodness Kathleen likes to sleep in Arctic conditions, too! The only bummer was not staying long enough to see Chicago. The view from our room was pretty spectacular. I think the tallest building in Wichita is like sixteen stories, no lie.




Companies sent stuff to our rooms, too! Crazy. I was so sad we couldn't take the gorgeous flowers home.



Realistically, though, there was a LOT of stuff to take home. Folks who have been to multiple BlogHers said that the swag lust at this one was insane and I can definitely believe it. There was so much stuff, it was frightening. And people were grabbing for it in very unseemly ways. It kind of creeped me out and made me question just how much stuff I really need when I have too much to review already. This is a picture of my swag pile, pre-packing. Keep in mind, Kathleen had a stack this big over on the other side of the room. We were swimming in stuff. Believe it or not, we were fairly selective in what we took.



The best "swag bag" was definitely from SocialLuxe, which was also the first party we attended. Coincidentally, the President was also at the Hyatt, which made it even more surreal. It was also the first place we witnessed the swag freakouts. People were in a frenzy over the free stuff. They gave you elastic wristbands to claim your goody bag and apparently people were tying them back on to get extra bags. Eeek! I kept thinking "that's someone's mom!" Not cool. And I guess it got even uglier when the bags ran out. I can't imagine yelling at the hosts of a fabulous party with tons of food and drink and entertainment because you didn't get gifts to take home. Double not cool. Most-coveted swag item in the bag: Kodak Zi6 Pocket HD Video Camera. Mine is pink and I am sure I will tell you more about it when I have time to try it out. Most totally random swag was also from the SocialLuxe bag:



Yes, it's a bobbleheaded doll version of Robert Osborne, the Turner Classic Movies guy. Huh? (I would have preferred season two of Mad Men…)



In the end, we had to pare the piles of stuff down into more manageable, packable size. Removing packaging, taking stuff we wouldn't use to the swag recycling booth, etc. If anyone wants to know the perfect swag item for next year, I would recommend duffel bags… my poor bags were busting at the seams.



The baggage handlers had a little note for me, too:



Back home in Wichita, Roo and Jasper hung some welcome signs on my office door:



It's good to be home.

BlogHer 09

Kathleen is such a great roommate! I'm really going to miss her and Candice when we go home. Not to mention Katja, Kristin, Allison, Renee, Sheena, Kim, among many other great new blogger friends. Way cool to watch Design Mom iron and see CityMama and Bad Kitty spur Carson Kressley's spontaneous nudity by gifting him with a Ript Fusion tee (Yummie Tummie's shapewear for men, FYI).

My WiFi is slooooooow and keeps booting me off so I'm just going to post a couple of pictures and tell you all about it next week...

Britax Marathon CS Review

We are a Britax family. Case in point:


Roo in her Marathon, Jasper in his Boulevard. They're like plush recliners for your kids, only with the added bonus of protecting them in the event of a crash. In fact, these carseats are so well-designed, they have been known to keep children safe even when the car they are riding in has been struck by a train! (I would still recommend not stopping on train tracks, in case you were considering doing some home-testing.) That seat was a Roundabout, a convertible seat that is good for rear-facing infants to 40 lb forward-facing kiddos.

We went with the Marathon when Roo was a baby because it has such a long lifespan. Britax carseats are not cheap but they are extremely well-rated and in our experience they are just as durable as they are plush and good-looking. When Jasper outgrew his infant carrier (at six months!), I discovered a new Britax convertible seat. The Boulevard is even cushier than the very similar Marathon (both seats are recommended for children up to 65 lbs) and my hands-down favorite feature for Jasper has been the No Re-thread Harness Adjustment which allows you to adjust the harness height without having to re-thread the harness straps– super handy when you have a rapidly-growing baby/toddler/kid. Roo was a much more gradual grower so it's not as much of an issue to have to switch out the harness height every six months or so when you pull the cover off to wash it.

We recently received a new Britax model, the Marathon CS. The "CS" refers to the Click & Safe audible indicator that helps to determine when the child seat harness is within range of appropriate snugness. I remember taking a carseat safety class when I was pregnant with Roo and being informed that an alarmingly high number of parents were installing their seats improperly AND using the harnesses incorrectly, as well. I think it might have been close to 70%! The Marathon CS is just as comfy and sturdy as its non-clicking predecessor but it does give me a reassuring feeling to know that there is a way to make sure the harness is optimally tightened. Especially since this seat is going to go in grandma's car…

The Click & Safe feature is also available in the Boulevard CS. (Did I mention how totally awesome that No Re-thread Harness Adjustment is for wiggly boys?) The Britax Marathon CS has a MSRP of (USD) $299.99 and can be found wherever quality baby goods are sold.