Dearest Love Comma Ashlee, Thank You, Love Comma Cameron

Last week I was super excited when I found out that I won my friend Ashlee's (from Love Comma Ashlee) very first giveaway!! And even more excited that the giveaway was for something that both of my kids could enjoy... A Sleepy Bear from Sleepy Wrap! The cute little guy (girl?) arrived today, just in time to cheer Cameron up when he was sick. Thanks Ashlee, Sleepy Wrap & the UPS man!! Here's a few pics of him playing with the Sleepy Bear (FYI, he calls the big bear "Mama Bear" OR "Lindsey" hahaha and the little bear is simply "Baby Bear").

Poor little sicky relaxing with his new buddies:



Lining them up so nicely (his sheepie is trying to blend in with the bears):



HUGS!!!:



And kisses (possibly performing CPR? who knows....):



And having a little chat with his pals (and notice his boo boo from a freak frisbee incident earlier this week, hehe):



Thanks again, Ashlee. Now Cameron and Aiden can be Sleepy Bear Buddies!!

So Proud of Cameron!

I have to keep this short because I have a job interview today (YAY!) but I am so excited to share this news!! I just got done a meeting with the school system that provides Cameron's speech therapy, and they said he is doing so well that after he turns 3 next month, they are going to close his case out! They are saying he was evaluated at a 24 month level, but they think he is actually higher than that. And his intelligibility was rated at 80%.

Short summary of what we went through as far as speech... When Cameron was 18 months, he was not saying a word. Nothing. Not only that, but he was getting so frustrated with his inability to verbalize his feelings/thoughts/wants/needs/etc, that he was banging his head on the floor, the wall, the door, everywhere. He had a permanent welt on his forehead foreverrrrr. The tantrums were out of control. His pediatrician referred him to the Infants & Toddlers Program thru the public school system. He was evaluated and they assigned him a special educator to come to the house once a week for an hour. I was never really fond of that whole idea, I felt as though he just needed speech services and nothing else. Because he was at his actual age level in every other area besides speech. So I let the special education continue for the time being because at the very least it seemed as though he enjoyed the teacher's company. Finally though, I got frustrated with his lack of progress and basically told his case manager that I wanted him in speech ASAP. At this point he was about 20 months old. The case manager told me that he was at a 9 month level with regards to his speech and that she didn't want to refer him to speech services because "you don't teach a 9 month old to talk, do you?". Ummm no you don't, but he was not ACTUALLY 9 months old, he was almost 2 YEARS OLD. So I called her supervisor and straight up said I refuse to work with this lady. And I want speech services started NOW. I think I scared her because I was so upset lol and she arranged for speech to begin soon afterwards.

Cameron started working with his teacher, Kerri, when he was about 2. Not long after that, he started saying colors (insisting red was yellow haha). Then he moved onto numbers. He LOVES numbers. He can count to 50. If he sees a number anywhere, he shouts it out. He can write numbers. He is also now doing the same with letters... He can identify every letter of the alphabet. He knows action words, he knows animals, animal sounds, he makes requests ("can i have a......") and he tells me when he's hurt ("hurt self"). I'm so proud. It seems like once he started with Kerri he just started talking on and on and never stopped. And he no longer bangs his head out of frustration. Now he sticks to plain ol' regular little boy skinned knees and bruised elbows :-)

I'm kind of sad tho. I love his teacher, she is so sweet. And Cameron loves her too. But now I guess I need to accept the fact that he is a talker and doesn't need her anymore.

Anyway, I gotta head out the door soon. But just wanted to brag!! YAY GO CAMERON!! Look at this adorable little boy, I love him more than words can describe...

Wordless Wednesday! Starring MOI.

Since the only thing(s) I ever take pics of are my babies & myself, I'm gonna show some pics of us together! BTW, you may notice some similarities in each pic, YES, my left side is what I consider my "good side" :-)

Lily, my first "baby" (RIP):




Baby Cameron:





Baby Aubrie:

pleased to meet you *curtsy*

so i just hit 50 followers!! not too shabby for only having this blog a couple of weeks. i figured that i should probably introduce myself, tell everyone a little bit about me so they know who is behind all the strange ramblings (nothing has been too strange yet, but i'd like to leave that option open).

i'm going to start by saying that, more often than not, i'm entirely too lazy to capitalize when necessary, so i hope that doesn't bother anyone too much. not only that, but my son decided to jam playdoh under my left shift key and it's way too much work for me to use the right one all the time. that being said, my punctuation might not be up to par either. this will continue until i stop being lazy and pull the key off myself and just fix it. i am a freak about spelling tho! i pride myself on never having to use spell check :-)



anyway, hi, i'm lindsey!! that's me up there ^^^ i'm 26 years old (born 11/24/83 which just so happens to be thanksgiving). i live in maryland in a teeny town that no one has ever heard of, so i usually just refer to the area i live in as "baltimore" since most people know where that is. baltimore is actually about 40 minutes south of here, but you all get the idea. i have a twin brother named patrick (pat is what he prefers), and an older sister named cristin. pat is the athletic one, cristin is the smart perfect one and i'm the problem child. isn't that the way it usually goes? i wish i could spend more time with my siblings. but they both have kids and lives now. we still get together on holidays and special occasions and we get along great. i just wish it was more often!!! i have relatively low self confidence (except for when i'm at walmart, then i feel super hot). i'm a stay at home mom to my 2 kids (i really should start thinking about some sort of source of real income one of these days). i cuss a lot (but i will do my best to refrain from doing so in this blog, just for you). i have awesome parents. my mom is my best friend. i lived next door to her for awhile and recently moved away so i'm still coping with that. it sucks being so far from her, even tho she drives me completely crazy the majority of the time. now she's 40 minutes away :-( but we still do our weekly saturday shopping trips and for that i'm very grateful. my dad lives in cape cod. he moved up there when i was 18. he says he wants to move back and i really hope he does soon because even tho it's been 8 years since he moved, i still feel a sense of loss at him leaving. i call him every day and we talk a lot. he visits once a month to see his grandkids. i love basset hounds (had one for 10 years ((the duration of her life--RIP lily)) and wanna get another as soon as my kids are old enough). i was a dog groomer for 2 years (i would like to get back into that one of these days). and i'm desperately trying to quit smoking (eww yucky). i refuse to cut my hair EVER (after having my hair viciously hacked off by a crazy psychopath ex, who is now in prison--yes this really happened. maybe someday i'll write about that, it was a pretty huge event in my life...a lot of my current personal issues in my own head are a result of that 5 year period and i'm not ashamed really) and because of that, i have hair to rival rapunzel's. i don't know crap about blogs, blog layouts, anything of the sort. maybe someone could take me under their wing?? ;-) i used to love writing when i was in middle/high school. but life took me in so many different directions that i never had time to keep up with that. as a result, my writing skills are a little rusty. i'm hoping that blogging will slowly start to bring it all back to me. i'm sarcastic, and pretty pessimistic in general, even tho i desperately try to prove otherwise about 99% of the time. i still slip up on occasion. i look sad or mad all the time, but i'm really not. i just don't like my smile. but other people say they do. i don't think they'd be honest to my face tho ;-) i don't have many close friends. i don't really relate to many people. but i'm a generally nice person even if people take me the wrong way (which happens a lot). i'm shy when talking to strangers, and usually say totally stupid things without thinking. but I MEAN WELL!

i have a son named Cameron Matthew (born july 27, 2007 which makes him almost 3 years old)


and a daughter named Aubrie Willow (born march 11, 2009... she is 14 months now).


if you do the math you'll figure out i got pregnant with Aubrie right before Cameron's first birthday, making them 20 months apart. and making me a total crazy person. i could go into great detail about both of them, but i really think they deserve a blog post of their own. so maybe i'll do that at a later date. but to sum up, they are both super cute, smart and sweet and probably the best kids in the entire world (besides your own of course!).

my only hobby, per se, is kettlebell workouts. i'm sure most of you have never heard of them, i hadn't either until fairly recently. but right now it is my favorite thing to do. i've never been a huge fitness freak, but now i totally am lol and i'm not afraid to admit it!! i've been up and down with my weight plenty of times (high school-up. after high school-down. pregnancy #1-up. long road to weight loss after pregnancy #1-down. repeat with 2nd pregnancy. you get the idea). i lost the baby weight after my 2nd pregnancy super fast, but still didn't look toned at all. i was "skinny fat". kettlebells totally changed that. i am toned now and just feel more strong and healthy. seeeeeeeee:




i don't want to turn this post into a PSA for kettlebell workouts tho. i will say that i am currently training to be a certified kettlebell instructor because right now it is what i love to do. and i don't see how that will ever really change anytime in the near future. but i started this blog as a way to keep track of my workouts for my own benefit. i apologize in advance if my posts about my daily workouts annoy/bore you. i find it helps me to put it in writing (typing) especially now that i am training for a long term goal. i never get tired of talking about kettlebell training, and no question about it is a stupid one. i would love to help anyone incorporate kettlebell training into their fitness routine, so any questions seriously don't hesitate to ask. i'd love to help!

another thing that i totally love is "friends" (the tv show, that is. i don't have many real life friends, so i like to live vicariously thru 6 fictional characters that left me for good 6 years ago... they must not be very good "friends", huh? hmmmph.) but i do love that show more than words can describe. luckily i have dvd's of each season and can watch to my hearts content. i can beat anyone at friend's trivia. i use friends references more often than i care to admit (and most people never "get" them because most people aren't freaks about the show like i am, but i accept that). to be honest, i try to use friends references whenever possible lol. i also try to relate my real life situations to friends episodes. it makes me feel like less of a loser for having problems ;-) i find myself constantly saying "this one time, on friends....". i think the only people who don't roll their eyes when i say that are my mom and sister who both love friends *almost* as much as me. but i still consider myself on my own "level". *brushes shoulder off*

....i never said i was very cool.

but basically my life is a nonstop juggling act. i try to juggle being a mom (a GOOD one), keeping my body together, and keeping my head on straight. turns out, i'm not so hot at juggling because i drop the ball(s) every single day. they really should make you take a course before you're even allowed to consider conceiving a child. but then i think that would mean the end of the world.

notice i didn't mention a man in my life. not because there isn't one, but because that is one of the balls i'm having the most trouble juggling. my kids have a wonderful, sweet, loving dad that i cannot say enough good things about. i love him very much, he is my best friend. but i don't know if i want to delve into everything that's going on with that particular situation right now. it would probably give you a headache. i know it has that effect on me. but rest assured, my kids and i are very very loved by him and the feeling is mutual.

but the aforementioned is the bare minimum about me. i hope i get to know each and every one of my followers and vice versa. i really appreciate you taking the time to read my blog!

xoxoxo,

lindsey